


the end result of my own reckless impulsivity

by Captain_Cap



Category: Marvel 2099, Spider-Man (Comicverse), Spider-Man - All Media Types, Spider-Man: Edge of Time (Video Game), Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse (2018)
Genre: Additional Warnings in Author's Note(s), Blood, Brotherly Love, Canon-Typical Behavior, Character Study, Completely Unsubtle References to the 90s Comics, Depression, Depression Metaphors, Eventual crossover with Spider-Man: Into The Spider-Verse (2018), Gen, Hurt/Comfort, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, Messing around with the timeline, Miguel is working through some Shit, Self-Hatred, and Domestic Abuse too ig, and he is not doing so hot, and miguel canonically curses like it's going out of fashion. so, but before she gets back from Xina's bachelor pad, cannot overstate this. yes this is a spider-man fic but first and foremost it is a Miguel O'Hara fic, look man if it takes a weird turn at some points then that's between me and my god, self-destructive behaviors, set after Lyla tries to commit homicide, soz for the cursing but i think peter should b allowed 2 say fuck
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-03-09
Updated: 2020-11-27
Packaged: 2021-03-01 01:00:31
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 6
Words: 19,774
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23076667
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Captain_Cap/pseuds/Captain_Cap
Summary: Gabriel O’Hara showed up at his brother’s apartment at eleven-oh-seven PM, sharp—on awork night,because of course his older brother couldn’t just beconvenientfor once in his life—in response to a distressing holo-message from Miguel that began with him falling over from a seated position and ended with a teary, slurred rant in such white-man Spanish that their mother would’ve hit him upside the head with an¡Hablemos!: Gramática para Niñosbook if she’d heard it.Although Gabriel would’ve much preferred to just let someone like Lyla or Dana (or, like,Xina,he supposed, if she and Miggy were still on speaking terms?) take the lead and comfort his wreck of a brother, Miguel had calledhim,and by decree of familial obligation Gabriel had no choice but to deal with his idiot supergenius older brother who was an asshole most of the time and also a stupidly emotional drunk.OR,Over time, and against his will, Miguel finds out how to love himself.(Title fromFriends With Youby The Scary Jokes!)
Relationships: Miguel O'Hara & Gabriel O'Hara, Miguel O'Hara & Lyla | LYrate Lifeform Approximation (Mentioned), Miguel O'Hara & Spider-Gang, Miguel O’Hara & Peter Parker, Various untagged relationships
Comments: 44
Kudos: 58





	1. Live, laugh, love, puke, man, that shit really doesn't work

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I Am Back On My Bullshit Of Devoting Too Much Time To This Dumb Fucker From The 90s That Only Thirteen People Care About.  
> Having written this fic is entirely self-indulgence on my part, because, uh. I am a sadsack starved for content. If I've gotta be the one writing gen, then c'est la vie.  
> But, if you are just browsing Spider-Man fics and stopped by, then PLEASE DON'T LEAVE I AM DESPERATE. PLEASE SOMEBODY TALK TO ME ABOUT MARVEL 2099 I BEG—  
>   
> (Chapter title from _Keep_ by Mother Mother!)
> 
> **CWs:** Irresponsible alcohol usage, followed by vomiting. Briefly implied child abuse. Self-destructive and dehumanizing thoughts and behaviors by the main character.

Drinking wasn’t really something that Miguel had much of a penchant for in his younger days. 

_…Well._

Okay.

It wasn’t something that he had a penchant of doing for the _clout_ of it, at least.

All the other kids at his school—especially once they’d gotten into their teens, though, _¡ay Dios!_ —acted like it was so slick, so cool and _dangerous_ that they’d gotten their hands on shitty booze brewed in a Downtowner’s bathtub, like it was something special and not just stupidly illegal.

Though, thinking back on it, perhaps that was what was so alluring to them: what better way to show your status than to flash a bottle of foul-smelling hooch forty years after it’d been outlawed? Then all the girls will think you’re _soooo_ cool, and your dad will finally pay attention to you and maybe pat you on the back and say “good job, son,” all proud-like instead of his normal wacky antics like waiting until he’s sure that you’re in the room before he starts yelling at mom. 

Though. Miguel might be an outlier, there. 

There’s just— there’s just something _familiar_ about it, he thinks in his adulthood, about the cotton-headed feeling of watching the world tilt as he lays horizontally, unmoving, on an amalgam of ratty old brown-black-beige-yellow-red sofas. There was a relief to it, at least for a little while in that golden period when he could feel his heart pattering funnily in his fingertips and the metal taste in his mouth faded to warm and sweet.

The morning after never really hurt, because he had so many other, old hurts that the dull ache in his skull was _fine, I’m good, pops, ‘m not some kind a’ sissy who can’t handle a little of the hard stuff, so you don’t gotta put on_ all _your rings, ‘s not like I’m gonna do it again—_

It is not reassuring anymore, now that he is no longer entirely Miguel. Try as he might, but he cannot erase the fact that there is something new and dangerous inside his body that no god would ever have put there.

(Never mind what the Thorites might say; he’s no harbinger, no godling, no great herald to save the misfortunate masses.)

(He’s had his ass kicked enough times to be pretty sure of this.)

The talons on his fingers leave deep scratches in the glass as he turns a bottle around in his hands. Little glass shards glitter like stars on the soft pads of his fingertips, right under where his talons normally lie, before slicing into his skin and turning wet and red. It stings less to watch them bury themselves in his flesh than it does to feel his skin knit back together almost immediately, little rubies sparkling as they are pushed back out of him.

Normally Lyla has stopped him, or called someone—Gabriel—to stop him, by the time he has forgotten how to keep his talons in. Miguel wonders where she is before remembering belatedly that she tried to kill him, and that he left her with Xina because of it. He then remembers that this is why he started drinking tonight in the first place. 

Optimistically, he will say it is because he misses her, and not because he knows that just for tonight she can’t stop him from doing things that will hurt him.

* * *

He spits and from his mouth spews blood and poison, tongue sliced open on teeth that don’t fit in his mouth right as white lights bloom in his eyes.

He is _afraid,_ deeply so, and for perhaps the first time since that awful night—since the many, successive awful nights that ruined his life and thrust him ass over tit into a terrifying new one—he finds himself terrified and unwilling to die. He is shaking with such force that his whole body is falling apart and the taste of blood has coated his mouth and all he wants to do is _stop stop stop stop no wait just no more please just let me stop—_

Miguel hunches over and heaves, throat burning, and he’s clutching himself so tightly that there will probably be bruises for about an hour before the foreign part of him that isn’t him will have healed them. 

(It is wrong to say that half of himself is not him, but sometimes he will glance in the mirror and _forget_ and then suddenly Lyla will be there coaching his breathing as he wonders if the slow death of rapture withdrawal would really be as bad as living the rest of his life as some kind of abomination.) 

His arms are sore.

He retches again and the acid burns his lips for just a moment as he realizes that he’s crying. From that realization comes a dull ache in his eyes as he tries to hold himself together, wanting desperately to stop hurting like an arrogant little kid who has been knocked down in his first fight. It’s unfair, he thinks, because he did not go through all the trouble of staying stubbornly alive—of guzzling enough booze to kill a horse while he was at it—just to keep on _hurting._

And it was such a process to get it, too! It wasn’t like he could just waltz into the hellhole of Downtown as himself, as Miguel, the genius, the poster child for big, bad Alchemax. Nevermind that he’d get jumped in an instant, Gabri’s girlfriend of the week—was it _Katy?_ Jamie? No, _Kasey,_ this one was Kasey—would probably be the one _jumping_ him, criminal that she was. Or maybe he’d be fine— maybe Gabriel had somehow found the one zorra in Downtown who secretly had a heart of gold, and all that bullshit. 

_Ha._ As if Gabri had that kind of luck.

But, no, Miguel couldn’t just flash his pretty-boy smile and hope that no one would notice what was, for all intents and purposes, a normal guy carrying a truckload of illegal substances in his arms without breaking a sweat. 

Of course, if _Spider-Man_ was seen carrying a veritable truckload of booze, well, then, there he goes, just doing his job! Must’ve busted up some smugglers, must be on his way _right now_ to go take care of all this alcohol in a proper and respectable way! What an upstanding member of our community, cleaning up us lowly folk one crime at a time!

Painful nausea seizes him again and Miguel spits the last dregs out of his stomach and his vision blurs, the wretched smell burning his nose before he sputters and makes a pitiful croak. He can’t _breathe,_ his throat’s all tight and it feels like there’s bile mixing with the snot in his nose.

He thinks, _this is why I stopped drinking,_ and then drags himself over to the couch and sluggishly tries to call— _someone._ His mind is swimming as he punches in the first familiar string of numbers and letters that he can think of, desperately and tiredly thinking _someone will help, someone will— I bet if Lyla was here, she would help me, but she isn’t here, she’s gone... she would’ve called Gabri by now, I think. Oughta call him, oughta call him..._

* * *

Gabriel O’Hara showed up at his brother’s apartment at eleven-oh-seven PM, sharp—on a _work night,_ because of _course_ his older brother couldn’t just be convenient for once in his life—in response to a distressing holo-message from Miguel that began with him falling over from a seated position and ended with a teary, slurred rant in such white-man Spanish that their mother would’ve hit him upside the head with an _¡Hablemos!: Gramática para Niños_ book if she’d heard it.

Although Gabriel would’ve much preferred to just let someone like Lyla or Dana (or, like, _Xina,_ he supposed, if she and Miggy were still on speaking terms?) take the lead and comfort his wreck of a brother, Miguel had called _him,_ and by decree of familial obligation Gabriel had no choice but to deal with his idiot supergenius older brother who was an asshole most of the time and also a stupidly emotional drunk. 

Nobody answered the door when he knocked, so, with a sigh, Gabriel flashed his card to the door’s scanner and squinted against the near-total darkness of Miguel’s apartment as he walked in. “Hey, uh, Mig? You there?” He continued to take halting steps forward, hand dragging along the wall behind him in search of a manual light switch. “This isn’t an S-man thing, is it? Like, I’m not gonna walk in and find you dead, right? ‘Cause I have to say, I _dooooon’t_ think I could avenge you—”

His foot snagged on something solid and he yelped, promptly eating shit on his brother’s weird rich-person-tile floors. “Oh, _ass,”_ Gabriel spat, rubbing his head. He pulled himself up to his elbows, squinting around for whatever he’d tripped over. 

Something sharp suddenly brushed his shoulder, and Gabriel screamed, turning onto his back and desperately wiggling away across the floor.

He glanced up and saw—saw two red lights, a demon out of hell come to drag him down for being dumb enough to do his big bro a favor—saw something crawling on the floor, _towards him,_ and groaning, and he screamed again, louder, kicking out. “Lyla!” Gabriel shrieked desperately. “Lyla, lights! Lights, please, _get the damn lights on, Lyla!_ ”

A very solid set of arms very swiftly wrapped around his chest _as the lights refused to turn on_ so he started thrashing, panicked, feeling hot breath on his face as whatever red-eyed beast that had taken up residence in his brother’s apartment opened its mouth to reveal gleaming fangs, and— 

_Wait._

_Gabriel_ knew _a red-eyed asshole with fangs that was living in his brother’s apartment._

—and made a sobbing sound, grabbing him by the cheeks and saying “she lef’ me, they always _lee-aave me, Gabri,_ I can’t make ‘em stay…” 

Gabriel looked his older brother in the eye—which was _hard_ , by the way, in a pitch-dark apartment—and sighed. Well. Lyla “left,” somehow (could AI even do that? Was that allowed?), so of _course_ it fell on him to keep Miguel from choking to death on his own vomit, or whatever. He made a face. Weren’t older siblings supposed to be the more responsible ones?

Goddamnit, Mig, hadn’t anyone ever told you about the _status quo?_ How can you be Spider-Man and not know how to maintain the same old stereotypes over decades of frustrating, repetitive arcs?

Gabriel shimmied out from under his brother, popping into a squat before grabbing Miguel by the forearm to heft them both up. “C’mon, güey, you're trashed— let’s get you to bed...” he squeezed a little too hard, and a small bit of webbing _fwizz_ ’ed its way onto Gabriel’s shirt. “Dude, gross, don’t shoot your sticky white stuff at me.”

Miguel seemed to miss the obvious joke and mumbled something about his pants still being on as Gabriel slung his brother’s arm over his shoulders. “That wasn’t an invitation to talk about your ween, Miggy. Just makin’ a silly joke about the—heh—thick white stuff you shoot all over the place.”

Miguel sadly moaned, “‘s _webs,_ but don’— don’ go r’peatin’ it, I’ve got a seeecret identi’y, so, so, _shhhhh,_ ennybody find out I’m gonna, like, _die,”_

Gabriel nodded thoughtfully before slamming his toe into a corner—because it was _dark!_ And Miguel was a _rich asshole_ without a _light switch_!—and yowling, “shocking _shit!”_

Miguel got excited, and his voice took on a dreamy tone. “Yeah! Yeahhhh it is some shockin’ bullshit! They’re gonna, uh, kill me! But it’s okay I think I might want them to. So. We’re good.”

“Ay Dios, you need therapy… Oh, but hey, look! We’re at your bed now! You should get in it.”

Miguel seemed unfazed as Gabriel awkwardly deposited him in bed, eyes already closed as he sagged onto the mattress. A weird almost-rumbling was coming from him, and that was… hm. “Are you dying, bro?” 

“No no no, no, no. Jus’, jus’ puberty. Spider-puberty.” Gabriel opened his mouth to protest that, whatever was happening, it most certainly wasn’t some secret second adult puberty, but then Miguel very helpfully put one hand in the air over his back and slurred, “se-con-daryy character, charact’ristic of the shitty gene mixin’. Goddamn shockin’ wolf spider shit. Couldn’, couldn’ separate it a’fore I got all shocky like this.” 

“Ah.” 

Gabriel lingered for a moment, making sure to tilt Miguel’s head so he didn’t choke on his tongue or on his vomit or anything, before he figured he could step out. “I’ll just, uh, see myself out, if you’re good— oh, why’m I talking to you? You’re out like a sack of bricks—”

He made it to the front door before he felt guilty for leaving Miguel alone. He sighed.

_I’ll just sleep on the shockin’ couch._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Mexican slang used:  
> \- Ay Dios: corruption of "¡Oye Dios!" which usually translates to the interjection(s) "dear Lord," and/or "oh God." Used as a scathing _”Dear Lord!”_ in this context.  
> \- zorra: basically, "bitch." literally, "vixen." used in a number of Spanish-speaking countries.  
> \- güey: literally translates to "guy," but in Mexican Spanish can mean "dude," "idiot," and a light-hearted "dumbass." often spelled "wey" by native speakers.
> 
> everyone is saying "shock" because if you said "fuck" in the nineties Stan Lee would come to your house and snap your neck, killing you instantly
> 
> comments and kudos feed your local author!
> 
> find me on tumblr **@spider-man-2o99**


	2. you don’t know what to want, if you wanted

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Miguel wakes to the blissfully greasy smell of frying eggs and the distinct aroma of canned tomato sauce. For a moment he is a child again, waking up on the rare Saturday morning where Dad was at work and Mom was in the kitchen singing some nonsense ditty to herself over the crackling of eggs in a pan.  
> (This is how he knows, on those rare Saturday mornings, that Dad is gone; Mom would never dare make such a joyful noise if _he_ was home to hear her.)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> EDIT: So, for the like... twenty-something of y'all who witnessed my blunder of accidentally uploading the draft: can we get an "f" in the chat for this one, lads?  
> But, seriously, thank u all for putting up with my mistakes. I understood why none of y'all kudos'ed, that shit was atrocious.  
> For the rest of you guys— thank you for reading not one, not three, but **two** chapters so far!! Spider-Man 2099 is an important character to me, and has been since I was a kid; I hope you enjoy reading this fic as much as I enjoy writing it!  
> (My statement from last chapter still stands, btw: any fans of Marvel 2099 out there... I beg... even just confirmation that i didn't hallucinate Hulk 2099's weird mullet would make my day...)
> 
> (Chapter title from _Death is A Girl_ by Mini Mansions!)
> 
>  **CWs:** Briefly implied domestic abuse, in a flashback.

Before he became Spider-Man, before he lost all faith in the company that had built him from the ground up, hell, before he even got his _powers,_ Miguel O’Hara was the poster child for Alchemax's science division. He was the kind of pawn that the company was eager to have its hands on— hard-working, a genius in his field, a graduate of The Alchemax School For Talented Youngsters. The perfect dystopia-perpetuating scientist.

He rose through the ranks in Nueva York with terrifying efficiency, hired straight from graduation to work at Alchemax HQ— a high honor for anyone on the company's payroll, and practically unheard of for new hires. It didn't help that they encouraged his cocky self-assurance to become plain arrogance; oh, of course, Miguel, you're the smartest guy in the room, of course we need your input on this project, you know what you're doing!

Point was, Miguel owed nearly everything he had to Alchemax: his money, his job, his swanky apartment, his education... his dickish nature.

Who knows what sad life he could have been leading if Tyler Stone hadn't seen his worth as a child, hadn't noticed his high test scores and had him enrolled in the Alchemax school.

Damn shame that Tyler Stone was a douche. Miguel was almost grateful for him.

* * *

According to all the various documents that Miguel could get his hands on from the Heroic Age, no one was entirely sure how Spider-Man’s powers worked. At least, not from a biological standpoint. 

Even S.H.I.E.L.D.’s official dossier—which had been acquired, along with a number of other assets, by Alchemax in 2069—wasn’t entirely clear on the extent of many of the wall-crawler’s abilities. Couldn’t even give him a civilian identity, so Miguel couldn’t just go search through the Mutant DNA Registry and paste the guy’s DNA onto some bonobos to see what would happen— although, apparently, Spider-Man had never officially registered with the government anyways, so it was a moot point.

As a geneticist looking specifically to replicate each and every one of Spider-Man’s powers, the lack of information… wasn’t great. Like, sure, some scientist from 2017 was _pretty sure_ that the hero climbed walls like a gecko, with electromagnetism and all that bullshit. Oh, and here’s an article from some long-since discontinued newspaper detailing that time Spider-Man punched three buildings into dust. Great! That could be programmed into a corporate raider, as long as they didn’t mind all the tendons in their fingers being inverted. He could even get in super-strength with enough time, no _sweat._

But, like, here’s the thing. Spider-Man crawled walls and was super strong, yeah. Dude even shot webs. He was mutat _ed,_ after all, purely the result of some kind of science-gone-wrong hijinks. All Miguel had to do, theoretically, was recreate the sciency bullshit that made Spider-Man all those years ago.

Except. There was also the early-warning system. The “Spidey-Sense.” 

Goddamn _precognition?_ Even if it was just rudimentary, how the hell was he supposed to give someone that ability just by messing with their _genes?_ Sources said that Spider-Man's powers came from a “radioactive spider,” so was he meant to just wave some radium around and hope to see the future?

(Later, he would think, precognition was the kind of hinky magic bullshit better off just left to _Strange._ Like, come on. That shit was always above his paygrade, anyways.)

It was hard enough putting spinnerets onto mammals, not to mention getting them to show up on the arms at _least_ 60% of the time— nevermind the process of making sure that they could even make viable silk in the first place! 

After all, who _cares_ that corporate raiders have access to the latest flight and anti-grav tech not even on the market yet; _Spider-Man_ got around by shooting webs everywhere, Mike, and Alchemax was promised a legion of Spider-Mans ( _Spider-Men?_ ), not a legion of Crawls-On-Walls-And-That’s-It-Dudes.

Miguel was so damn close to snapping for 90% of the project that, when Delgado got him mutated into a half-spider freak in the end, he just about lost his shit.

Of _course._ Of _course_ it ended this way! 

He spends three years trying to recreate a superhero that was for all intents and purposes a shocking _ghost_ in the system, gets too cocky with thinking that Alchemax would just let him _leave_ when people start dying, and then becomes the only subject to actually _survive_ the testing process by complete accident!

Stupid, naïve Miguel, thinking he could walk out on a megacorporation. Here's your shocking karma for all those years you spent as an asshole.

* * *

Miguel wakes to the blissfully greasy smell of frying eggs and the distinct aroma of canned tomato sauce. For a moment he is a child again, waking up on the rare Saturday morning where Dad was at work and Mom was in the kitchen singing some nonsense ditty to herself over the crackling of eggs in a pan. 

(This is how he knows, on those rare Saturday mornings, that Dad is gone; Mom would never dare make such a joyful noise if _he_ was home to hear her.)

It is an old kind of recurring memory, from back in the early years when she still had her mind— when she was actually _happy,_ as she sang and danced and actually _made_ breakfast instead of just reheating the synthesized stuff they got in shipments from Alchemax every month.

Sometimes Miguel would get up early enough to watch her working in the kitchen. If he behaved himself, she would let him help by doing _very important_ tasks like picking out the juiciest-looking tomatoes or the very roundest eggs from inside the fridge. She would smile at him and then try to connect it to the things he was learning in preschool— _I bet you know this, mijito inteligente, that these are eggs, and they come in twelves, and twelve comes after eleven; eleven is how many months old your little brother is right now, and that’s a big number for eggs but a little one for a boy’s age._

Adults always liked to quiz him on obvious things, which he didn’t really care for, but it made Mom happier if he just answered instead of kicking up a fuss and “questioning her authority as the adult.”

So when she would tell him things he’d already known, Miguel would just nod in solemn understanding because he could count all the way up to twenty on his fingers and toes, and eleven and twelve were easy since they were his big toes. Mom would be delighted and press a wet kiss to his cheek and call him a “regular prodigy,” because adults thought that any number over ten was a very exciting number for a four-year-old to know.

...

it’s— 

—a stabbing worse than the damn Vulture’s claws spears through his skull and Miguel is flung violently from the memory, stars twinkling across his vision as he moves to rub at his temples.

(He tries very hard not to think of the inherent _wrong_ feeling of folded talons against the bones of his forehead, of the way he is quietly revolted by the way his own fingers are no longer soft and warm but instead hard, immalleable; long strips of keratin digging into his skin like the hard plastic tags on thrift-store clothes.)

He groans, regrets it instantly for the pulse it sends across his head.

Seems like enhanced healing doesn’t cover hangovers.

It crosses his mind that he _could_ just shove his head back into the pillows and sleep off his hurts and his responsibilities, but, then, the last time he’d tried to play hooky with Alchemax—with Tyler _shocking_ Stone—he’d been addicted to a practically lethal drug against his will, so… 

Miguel kicks out with a foot in an attempt to escape the covers before realizing too late that he’s got gods-forsaken knives on his toes, the unpleasant and increasingly familiar sound of ripping fabric a mocking slap to the face as he shreds yet another blanket. “God _damnit!”_ he hisses, even angrier as he realizes that there’s mattress stuffing between his toes as well. _There goes_ another _shocking bed in, what, six months? Good going, screw-up._

His _tongue_ hurts, too, almost as much as his head, and he gently runs a finger over it. Four suspiciously-curved punctures, just healed enough that he can make “d” sounds, apparently, prove to be the culprits. _Yeowch._ Good thing he’s not an orator, then.

But.

He does still need to get out of bed.

Miguel turns over so that he’s laying stomach-down on the bed, draws his knees up under himself until he’s in a sort of “depressed snail” position. From there he puts his hands, palms-down, by either side of his chest and braces before forcibly shoving himself upwards. He spends a triumphant handful of seconds upright and then flops back down, bouncing with his mattress until he slides ungracefully to the floor. 

Because Miguel O’Hara is a shocking _adult,_ and he can get out of bed any way that he damn pleases to.

* * *

_“¡Huevos rancheros para mi hermano estúpido!~”_ Gabriel sang, shaking his hips and waggling a spatula at the brother in question. “ _He is a goddamn idioooot, but he looooves me because I made him breakfast after his dumb ass got sad druuunk!_ ” 

Miguel blinked, wobbling in place for a moment. When he spoke, he almost sounded like he’d burned his tongue. “I’m gonna kick— gonna kick your ass, Gabri.”

“You can’t touch my ass,” sniffed Gabriel, clutching the spatula to his chest. “That’s harassment. Har- _ass_ -ment.”

Miguel frowned, and then winced at the way it pulled on his forehead. He stepped forward, and Gabriel batted his eyelashes innocently. 

“Just give me the damn eggs, you shit.” He doesn’t give his brother time to react, suddenly webbing the spatula away and scrambling to grab his rightfully earned post-boozing breakfast eggs. “Stone is gonna have _my_ ass if I don’t— if I’m late, I— I’ve already got my two yearly infractions, man, I don’t wanna find out what they do to you at lucky number three. Heard the last dude who acted up got fed to Winston.”

“Winston—? Oh, Stone’s assistant?” Gabriel grimaces. “Look, uh, Mig, you don’t have to worry, I called in sick for you like, three hours ago. You’ve unfortunately come down with a case of the very real Hispanish Flu—which only affects Hispanic people—and I, as your loving brother, have nobly endangered myself to make sure you survive this tumultuous illness.”

“There’s no shocking way that Stone _bought_ that.”

Gabriel grinned. “Didn’t even question me. I think he likes you.”

“Gross,” replied Miguel, wrinkling his nose and letting some fang peek through. “Only thing that bastard likes is married women and the tears of orphans and widows.”

“And you, apparently, if he’s barging into your apartment in the middle of the night so often that one of your neighbors asked me if you were cheating on Dana.” He paused, putting on a cutesy voice and cooing, “and _oh,_ isn’t it sweet how he only wants Spider-Man alive? _Ooh, Miguel, your work is so_ valued _here, why I’d just be_ devastated _if we killed Spider-Man and it all went to waste!_ And then he finds out that you’re Spider-Man, dramatically, and you fall in love and lick his boots as much as your little heart desires and you live happily ever after—”

Miguel reached over and shoved him, repeating emphatically, “gross!” and pulling a face. “Nevermind my _engagement to Dana,_ Tyler shocking Stone is old enough to be my dad, güey.”

“Awh, ¿de repente eres leal a tu pinche prometida? Swiped her from me and decided now was the time to end your whoring ways?”

“Ay _Dios,_ Gabri, you can’t _say_ that in the year of our Lord twenty-and-ninety-nine, that’s so problematic.”

Gabriel huffed, getting up from his seat and retrieving his (now sticky) spatula, beginning to whap Miguel with it as he harrumphed, “I’ll _show_ you problematic, Mr. Ho-Who-Cheats-On-His-Girlfriend-With-Mine!”

Miguel spat, fumbling as he tried to grab his brother and throw him to the ground. “Quit hitting me— no, Gabri, seriously, you’re getting grease in my hair—! I’ll bite you, goddamnit!”

“Bite my ass, cabrón! You don’t get a choice in this!”

* * *

Their play-fight ended almost anticlimactically— true to his word, Miguel managed to get his fangs on Gabriel, paralyzing him for a very uncomfortable quarter of an hour. He apologized immediately, though, of _course_ he did; it wasn’t like he was _trying_ to poison his brother. With respect to sibling tradition they agreed that at some unspecified point in the future, Gabriel was fully allowed to bite Miguel back as long as their mother was never told of the incident.

They shook hands on it and everything. It was very official.

Uncomfortable silence blanketed the room as both brothers moved back to the table, quietly trying to enjoy what they could salvage of their breakfast and occasionally flicking droplets of tomato sauce at each other from across the table.

Miguel coughs, at some point, and says in an uncharacteristically small voice, “I wasn’t— I didn’t do anything, last night, did I?” 

“Not really, no, you mostly just conked out once I got you into bed.” Gabriel pauses, trailing off for a moment. He scratches his throat and then says, “well… You did, uh, you _did_ get up once or twice… Didn’t do much, though, so, you’re good.” He smiles weakly, and then repeats, “you’re good.”

* * *

Miguel woke up a number of times throughout the night.

Mostly, it was humorous, nonsense stuff that Gabriel could laugh at once he’d gotten Miguel back in bed. _Mostly._

Put a pin in that, it’ll be important later.

* * *

Nobody told him this when he first donned the costume, but, _apparently,_ there were other Spider-people out there aside from Miguel. Not just the one who had lived and died mysteriously in the past— no, there was a whole-ass _multiverse_ out there specifically tuned towards Spiders of all shapes and sizes, presided over by some presumptuous old bat who called herself _Madame Web,_ as if she was in some kind of _comic book,_ or something. 

Miguel was just going through his life as usual when out of nowhere he gets ripped from Nueva York—and, as it would turn out, from his own _dimension_ —and is forced to team up with three other Spider-Men to dramatically save the day from some great, terrible threat that he forgets about the moment he goes home.

And while that “adventure” was easy enough to write off as maybe just a weird side-effect of getting his head slammed into things on a regular basis, Miguel would admit that it had gotten him… curious, one could say, about the rest of the multiverse. _Maybe,_ he would find himself thinking, _if all of that_ was _real, then maybe I can figure out how to “jump” universes on my own._

Sure, he was a geneticist and not a physicist, but he also had a hyperintelligent AI on his side in the form of Lyla. Not to mention Lyla’s creator Xina Kwan, who would at least be kind enough to not laugh in his face if he asked her for help. 

She probably wouldn’t help, given their shared history, but she would at least be kind enough not to laugh.

* * *

_Was the multiverse worth it?_

Hmm.

Spider-Man 67. “Superior” Spider-Man. _Spiders_ -Man. All the edgy guys walking around covered in symbiotes that slowly sucked the life out of them. 

They weren’t that great.

But...

That kid, Miles; that other kid, that other kid, the detective, the dad, the pig.

He hadn't been _looking_ for them, but he found them all the same. 

Those guys were pretty okay.

* * *

**Kilometers Morales:** tfw u burn ur incisive foramen on sum hot Bagel Bitez™ and now cannot talk w/o immense pain 😞

 **Gerard Way `*:･ﾟ✧*:･ﾟ✧`:** oh no!!! are you okay? ‿︵‿︵(ಥ﹏ಥ)‿︵‿︵

 **G’wanda:** F

 **🅱️eter:** f

 **Kilometers Morales:** i mean. it hurts and i cant talk but on the plus side dad didnt ask any questions when he walked in on me sobbing on the floor covered in Bagel sauce

 **HamHock:** F

 **Kilometers Morales:** guys stop putting fs i havent died yet

 **Nick Cage Impersonator:** BUT YOU WILL STOP ONE DAY STOP

 **Kilometers Morales:** hello noir

 **Gerard Way `*:･ﾟ✧*:･ﾟ✧`:** Noir!! .｡*ﾟ+.*.｡(❁´◡`❁)｡.｡:+*

 **Nick Cage Impersonator:** HELLO STOP BELOVED FRIENDS STOP

 **G’wanda:** Hate to break this up, but Miles could u please repeat to me the specific thing u burned?

 **Kilometers Morales:** my incisive foramen?

 **G’wanda:** Yeah what the fuck is that

 **🅱️eter:** language, gwen

 **Kilometers Morales:** arent u in ap bio? dont try to tell me they didnt teach u about the wonders of the hard palate

 **G’wanda:** Do I look like I am a dentist, Miles

 **Kilometers Morales:** yes

 **G’wanda:** @🅱️eter Please save me from this child he is being unruly

 **🅱️eter:** i mean, to be fair, i don’t know what it is either

 **G’wanda:** @Nick Cage Impersonator? @HamHock? @Gerard Way `*:･ﾟ✧*:･ﾟ✧`? Y’all got any ideas?

 **Nick Cage Impersonator:** APOLOGIES STOP I AM SEEING WORDS STOP BUT I DO NOT UNDERSTAND THEM STOP

 **HamHock:** No clue, sorry kid. Probably in his mouth if he can’t talk, tho ;8)

 **Gerard Way `*:･ﾟ✧*:･ﾟ✧`:** Sorry, Gwen! o(╥﹏╥) I’m a robots scientist, not a mouth scientist!! ｡･ﾟﾟ･(థ Д థ。)･ﾟﾟ･｡

 **G’wanda:** Then it looks like I have to pull out the big guns

 **G’wanda:** The only person in this chat to have a doctorate

 **🅱️eter:** hey

 **🅱️eter:** i have multiple degrees and at _least_ one of them is a doctorate

 **G’wanda:** @Radical 90s Sk8rboi

 **G’wanda:** @Radical 90s Sk8rboi

 **G’wanda:** @Radical 90s Sk8rboi

 **Radical 90s Sk8rboi:** WHAT

 **Radical 90s Sk8rboi:** I am DOING something what could you POSSIBLY need from me

 **G’wanda:** Miguel what is an incisive foramen

 **Radical 90s Sk8rboi:** Cluck you.

 **Radical 90s Sk8rboi:** It’s the fleshy knob of your hard palate behind the incisors.

 **Radical 90s Sk8rboi:** Never talk to me again.

 **Radical 90s Sk8rboi:** I mean. What do I look like? A shocking dentist?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Mexican slang used:  
> \- güey makes a triumphant return, used as "dude" in this context.  
> \- pinche: an exaggeration word that basically translates to "fucking" (non-sexual tho)  
> \- cabrón: translates literally to "male goat." it is a very rude thing to say to someone, often interpreted as "fucker," "asshole," or "bitch."  
> Gabriel's angry little sentence there, "Awh, ¿de repente eres leal a tu pinche prometida?" is, in English, "Aw, suddenly you're loyal to your fucking fiancée?" because, fun little 2099 fact, Miguel stole his brother's girlfriend Dana and then got engaged to her. what an ass.  
> "cluck" is Marvel 2099's other alternative to "fuck"  
>   
> comments and kudos feed your local author!
> 
> find me on tumblr **@spider-man-2o99**


	3. [it's] hard to be optimistic and realistic at the very same time

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> When Peter sees Miguel again for the first time in fifteen years, his first thought is not _ah, yes, my close friend and ally, Miguel O’Hara, with whom I have previously endured a number of entertaining, high-stakes shenanigans!_
> 
> Hell, his first thought isn’t even _yo, ain’t that the matrilineally-Latino Spider-Man in black and red, whose father has a dark secret, who takes my place after I die? Well by jove, it is! My young protégé, Miles Morales— wa- wait, that isn’t Miles? Who the fuck is “Miguel”? Who even gives a shit about_ this _dude?_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Whew! I'm not entirely sure that I've got a lot of confidence in this chapter. But, hey, I did miss last month's update, which was very not tubular of me, so by way of apology here's twice as much content! Yup, you heard me— this chapter is two times as long as a normal one. I do hope you enjoy it.  
> (Side note— this chapter is almost entirely character study. Sorry 'bout that. Next chap is almost entirely plot, though, so if you'll bear with me, it. Kind of balances out? I hope?)  
> If I wake up tomorrow and find that I've accidentally uploaded the draft again, I'll blow a gasket. To take my mind off of it let's talk about how Strange 2099 had a really cool eyebrow piercing for 2 (two) issues and then it was never seen again. That's weird, right?  
> EDIT: Updated content warnings
> 
> (Chapter title from _Good Morning, Mr. Wolf_ by Patrick Watson!)
> 
>  **CWs:** Dehumanizing thoughts by the main character. Three sentences of mild mild gore. Spider-Man saying the fuck word. Domestic abuse and _heavily_ implied child abuse, from the pov of the abuser (scene is skippable and a summary is in the end notes).  
> 

When Miguel became Spider-Man, he was… _surprised,_ to say the least, in regards to the side-effects of his mutation. 

(Nevermind the inherent surprise of getting mutated in the first place— nevermind the shock, the horror, the initial certainty that his body would reject itself and he would die in horrible agony as his cells ripped themselves apart.)

When he realized what had happened to him, that his own spider program was being used against him in an act of petty revenge by _Aaron Delgado,_ of all people, he was— he was angry, frustrated and... afraid, down to his bones. If he’d _known—_ if he could’ve plucked a thought from the tangled snarl of instinct and floaty weightlessness in his mind, maybe he would’ve reacted differently. 

No, he knows, he abso _lutely_ would’ve acted differently. In the heat of the moment Miguel wasn’t thinking, too focused on trying to figure out why there was someone else in the room, why he could feel the wind on his face, why his mouth felt so oddly full. He saw Aaron, just— just _standing_ there, looking smug and particularly asshole-ish until Miguel turned around and then suddenly blanching, pulling a goddamn gun as if he’d seen a shocking ghost or something— should’ve tipped Miguel off, but he was just so _tired,_ his head hurt, he wanted to _sleep_ for shock’s sake. 

It’s a shame that professional therapy was outlawed in 2078; he isn’t sure he’ll ever get over the memory of Delgado swandiving out of a skyscraper to get away from him.

But. 

That’s aside from the point.

What matters is that when Miguel realized that his very DNA had been rewritten, there were a number of changes that he _wasn’t_ expecting. The spinnerets, the strength, the healing factor? Of course, he’d put those there on purpose, natch. But, then, the other aspects—the telescopic vision, the red eyes, the fangs, the damn rumble in his chest whenever he got stressed or happy or what _ever—_ that wasn’t supposed to be there. That was his little passion project being too rushed, not nearly ready enough to be imprinted on a human subject. That was _sloppy._ It wasn’t even supposed to _be_ ready for another year or two; Miguel hadn’t thought to expect that it would be used as soon as it was, much less _on_ him.

Although, it wasn’t really supposed to be on any kind of _normal_ person, anyways. He was making a corporate raider so that Alchemax could spend less time and resources paying natural mutants and just make their own instead. They could extend their reach even further— raiders would go after more people than just repeat criminals or rival CEOs. If they had a fleet of Spiders, Alchemax could go after the small fry, too— anyone from Neuva Yorkers behind on their bills to potential talent working for other companies. Who cares if the headhunters have eye-shine when they’ve just threatened your family, right? Why’s it matter that the guy who just kidnapped you from your place of work has teeth big enough to turn on a vampire enthusiast? They’re still doing the job that they were programmed for, aren’t they?

Corporate raiders were _supposed_ to be noticeable. People were supposed to be able to take one glance and realize that they weren’t in the presence of a regular person. It served, in a sense, as a show of strength, and as a brand— this is someone that serves Alchemax’s every whim. This is somebody that won’t hesitate to gut you like a fish if they’re told to, without even asking why or regretting it. Our grasp is absolute. You’d better behave or this’ll be the last face you see.

Of course a corporate raider has fangs and red eyes and spinnerets: it’s not _human._ It’s a tool, its whole existence dedicated to fulfilling the needs of the corporation. 

* * *

Love was weird for him. It didn’t matter all that much at first when there was never enough of it to go around, when he was just a kid watching his parents hate each other. Things got more complicated as he aged, though, as things tend to do.

Miguel didn’t really have crushes as a kid. Everyone around him seemed to go all moony after hitting puberty, and playground talk devolved into middle- and high school cafeteria squabbles over who-loves-who and who’s-dating-who and who’s-in-love-with-but-hasn’t-told-who. Maybe the closest thing he got to a crush was Xina, but anyone with half a brain could see how cool Xina was. She pissed in his dad’s drink, for god’s sake. Sure, Miguel never really got butterflies in his stomach when he talked to her, and he really _didn’t_ want much aside from her friendship until much, _much_ later, but they talked and were on good terms so according to school rules they should’ve been dating. 

They did get together, eventually, but it happened _way_ after graduation. They’d been friends for the wild and young parts of their twenties, right up until his twenty-seventh birthday when she finally just said something so insignificant in the grand scheme of things that made his heart flip-flop funnily as he realized _oh, this is what it’s like to love-love someone._

He was scared at first. But he liked the way it felt to hold her in his arms, and the way their lives blended so seamlessly together anyways.

It was an intimate relationship— sure, in the romantic sense, but as well in a _gentle_ sense. They were people who knew each other. Sure, every now and again there might've been a big romantic gesture or two, but more frequently they loved each other in the little ways that were as natural as breathing.

A warm tea with the bag left in because he likes his tea strong, pushed into his hands; a gifted plastic snow-globe, nearly a hundred years old, with four little blue-suited figures inside and emblazoned with the message _"Have a **Fantastic** Holiday Season!"_ that she keeps even after they split up. A shoulder massage after a long day. Egg sandwiches made, together, at ten PM as they laugh breathlessly over jokes that aren't even that funny. Quiet nights of just _holding_ each other, neither saying a word as they just breathe in and out in almost-sync.

Sure, they'd fight. Everyone does. But they always made up, talked and kissed and moved on with their lives.

Miguel didn’t use many pet names with Xina— maybe every now and again he’d say teasingly, “Miss Kwan,” but he would always prefer to use her first name. “Honey,” or “dear,” on occasion. She thought it was cute.

Dana was always “lover,” “sweetheart.” She was this— this fragile little thing, naive and far too trusting. They never fought. But he wasn’t— he didn’t get with her because she was stupid, no matter what his slimeball dad said. See, Miguel really _did_ think he loved her for the first few years, enough to get _engaged_ to her, even. Enough to break his girlfriend’s and his brother’s hearts by cheating with her in the first place. Dana was… she was safe. She loved him wholly and with a total sense of vulnerability— he thought it was what he craved, until he realized one day with disgust that it was the same kind of blind love that a _dog_ would give. Dana didn’t love in an adult kind of way. She threw herself into a relationship like a teenager who hadn’t been hurt before, and it made Miguel almost ill. They were at different wavelengths, plain and simple. 

He had thought that this was what he wanted. Xina was… Xina was too much _like_ him, combative and smart, smart, smart. Xina didn’t laugh when he said something shitty, she smacked him on the arm and said hey, smart-ass, you’re being an asshole. Xina matched him tit for tat and that was… frightening. Usually the only people who cared enough to show that they could match him—hell, even _surpass_ him—did so to belittle, to tear him back down for being so built-up in the first place. They were usually like him— looking for that momentary high, that rush of feeling _superior._

Xina wasn’t like that. Xina seemed to, for whatever reason, actually _care_ about his personal growth. Xina didn’t just say something equally as shitty and then lord it over him. She just gave him a disappointed look, as if she’d expected better of him. Miguel actually felt _bad_ afterwards.

That’s not to say that she wasn’t funny, or that he didn’t know how to make her laugh in turn. They were both asses in their own right, both had sharp wits dry as the Sahara on a hot day. Gabri once said that if he could get them both going against a common enemy it was as entertaining as the soaps that Mom used to watch.

Maybe it had taken the trauma of becoming Spider-Man to really get his priorities in order. Maybe that was why he had broken things off with Dana, had realized that he wasn’t what she needed, that he just couldn’t love her back in the same way that she loved him. Maybe that was why he was thinking of Xina so much, lately. Or, perhaps, he was just thinking of Xina because he wanted Lyla back and the quickest way to do that would be staying on her good side until repairs were done. 

Who could really even say, anyways?

* * *

There are long, yellow-purple-green bruises along his forearms, starting at the tops of the wrists and tracing in an odd curve towards his inner elbows. 

Curious, he puts a finger to the tender elbow-skin, traces it outwards until he feels lumpy silk glands under the bruise and it clicks. He turns his arm, looking at its silhouette and the outlines of its muscles. It never really… occurred to him until now, that his muscles had to have been reworked to fit silk glands and spinnerets in. 

Never really occurred that he might’ve messed something up, reworking them.

Of course, in the back of his mind he always _knew._ But he knew it in the same way that he knew what thirteen-squared was off the top of his head. He’d designed the spider program, hadn’t he? It would be negligent to just shove shit together and hope that it would work without a nigh-endless cycle of test after test after test. The problem, though. The problem was that the program plain _wasn’t_ ready for a human subject. The bruises are a testament to that: the way his body was reworked wasn’t perfect. Miguel can put as many ice packs as he wants on his arms, but unless he can figure out how to more efficiently shoot webs, the bruises are just going to come back.

He gently covers the opening on his wrist with a warm hand. It’s still disconcerting to see the little slits— kind of like looking in a fish’s gills, his brain saying that it ought to hurt because he’s not supposed to see what’s on the inside unless something’s wrong. 

All the silk production happens in the inner forearms, and when he shoots it out it goes up, between the ulna and radius, to the openings at his wrists. Now that he’s got the time to quietly inspect it, he realizes… It hurts. He’s sure he’ll get used to it, and once the new muscles really develop it won’t even be a problem. 

But for now? 

It hurts.

(At least the bruises heal quickly. He’s not used to them doing that.)

* * *

When Peter sees Miguel again for the first time in fifteen years, his first thought is not _ah, yes, my close friend and ally, Miguel O’Hara, with whom I have previously endured a number of entertaining, high-stakes shenanigans!_

Hell, his first thought isn’t even _yo, ain’t that the matrilineally-Latino Spider-Man in black and red, whose father has a dark secret, who takes my place after I die? Well by jove, it is! My young protégé, Miles Morales— wa- wait, that isn’t Miles? Who the fuck is “Miguel”? Who even gives a shit about_ this _dude?_

Nah. Peter doesn’t even really think when he sees another spider-themed figure about three-quarters of the way through his patrol. He just kinda _sighs,_ ‘cause he is _so_ tired of the whole “other, renegade spiders” thing that he just takes a moment to connect _red, black,_ and _intimidating_ in his mind and assume “oh, yeah, Kaine’s got some new threads or whatever the fuck and is also back from his and Ben's super secret Scarlet Spider Vegas murder-bonding tour” and swings towards the guy. Other dude seems to take the hint and course-corrects to a nearby rooftop, doing a showy flip that ends with a midair split that shows off _way_ too much crotch.

Peter just sighs again, does not sing “spider-taint, spider-taint,” under his breath, and lands with a somersault-y roll that looks cool and makes the healed break in his back scream with anguish. He starts to talk without thinking— his clones are basically brothers at this point, even if he’s been alive twice as long as them.

“Kaine Parker, you muderous bitch, stop killing people—in nightclubs or otherwise—when you’ve got my fucking face,” he says, jamming a knuckle into his mid-back. The stretch he’s doing has him curving like a bow, chest puffed out and hips angled in a way that almost-painfully pulls on a muscle in his groin. “I’m gonna be arrested someday for your actions, you Shadow the Hedgehog lookin’ motherfucker.”

The guy blinks. He follows the line of action of Peter’s body, accidentally glances at his ass, looks away abruptly. “I’m, uh, who’s—? Um. I’m not. Kaine. Whoever that is.” 

Peter freezes, straightening. “Who, uh,” he steps back a little, brushes his fingers against the release button of his web-shooters. “Who are ya’, then, bucko? _Another_ clone? Long-lost relative with inexplicable spider-powers? Just a dedicated cosplayer in a weird get-up?”

Not-Kaine squints at him. Peter’s struck with the feeling of watching _Wallace and Gromit_ -type animation, looking at a mask and figuring out expressions without a mouth to rely on, just watching red-lined brows knit together. He wonders if his own mask also squints that much, if the lenses constrict as much as he tried to design them to. Two decades of Spider-Manning and he’s still not ever really sure that he’s gotten it to emote quite right.

Then Not-Kaine says something that grabs his attention as fiercely as slapping a hot stove with a bare hand, quiet and surprisingly thick with emotion. “You uh, don’t remember me at all, do you, Peter?”

Lightning shoots down his spine. He steps forward, and says flatly, “how do you know that name.” And then, fiercely, “and keep your fucking voice down. What’re you lookin’ to start, huh?”

The other guy just looks hurt. “And here I was, thinking I was at least a little memorable… C’mon, old-timer, you really forget my pretty face so quickly? I thought we had something special.” 

He puts up his hands non-threateningly, letting Peter get close enough to really inspect him. There’s a bulky watch-looking device on his arm, and Peter hovers over it. Something about it seems familiar, and the longer he looks at it the more certain he becomes that he’s not imagining the buzz at the base of his neck. “What’s up with this, eh? You secretly a Mighty Morphin’ Power Ranger or somethin’?”

Guy huffs softly. “Or somethin’.” And then he rolls his shoulders, says, “nah, Pete, it’s a little goober of mine— don’t need Madame Web’s permission for this shit; made it all by myself… uh, with help, of course.”

“Madame Web?” Peter echoes. He Realizes, then, who he’s talking to, and kicks himself as he takes in the distinctive red Día de Muertos skull on a field of cool black. “O’Hara? What the— how the hell are you here? Why— it’s, it’s been years, man, what brings you to my little corner of the multiverse?”

Miguel looks just as surprised as Peter. “Years—? I just saw you five months ago…” he trails off, then looks off into the distance. “Oh, this is some time-travel bullshit, isn’t it.”

Unexpectedly, Peter finds himself laughing. Last year he dealt with multiverse-collision bullshit. Now he gets to experience time-travel bullshit, _again,_ because apparently his universe is a hotbed for weird shit. He almost expects for Miguel to shuffle aside and reveal that he’s brought Miles along behind him, because wouldn’t that just be icing on the cake?

Then he realizes that his future counterpart has got a _lot_ of catching up to do. He and MJ weren’t even _married_ when he last saw Miguel, much less divorced and then tentatively back together after a painful separation. Shit, last time they’d seen each other, Peter hadn’t even broken his back yet. He hadn’t even been _cloned_ (for the first of many, many times) yet. Does Miguel even know about Peter’s recent excursion into the Spider-Verse?

He punches Miguel on the shoulder, lightly for a Spider and strong enough to bruise for a normal person. “We’ve got a lot to talk about, you and I,” he hums, gaze drifting back to the device on Miguel’s wrist. “I’d say that goober’s probably top of the list.”

Miguel hums back. “Probably,” he agrees, not elaborating.

“Oh, knock it off. I’ll take you to the greasiest burger joint in the big apple if you show me how to make one.”

He couldn’t really be sure, but Peter would bet good money that Miguel was grinning under his mask. “Sure, sure. Burgers first, then we’ll talk.”

Peter punches him again, and laughs. “C’mon, then, you— you young rapscallion, you. Let’s get some goddamn burgers and talk science.”

* * *

Everyone’s got the same basic mental image of an abusive husband, right? The sweaty, balding, white guy in a stained off-white tank top who very publicly hits and berates his poor innocent wife; the guy who always stinks of beer and cigarettes and whatever drugs you want to imagine that his brand of trailer-trash partakes in.

And, sure, this guy probably exists somewhere. Statistics say that _somewhere,_ at _some point,_ there was or will be a dude fitting this exact description who is exactly as shitty as everyone thinks he is.

But there’s a problem with _this specific guy_ being the poster child for an abusive husband. 

See, if he’s not addicted to drugs or alcohol or tobacco, and he doesn’t hit his wife where people can see the marks, and he isn’t below the poverty line and has a nice quiet little suburban house with two well-behaved little kids, how are you supposed to _know_ that he’s the scum of the earth? If you can’t glance at him, can’t go to his house and see big glowing signs, how are you supposed to tell that your close good friend is actually a terrible man? Who would look at his son, his brother, his neighbor, and not believe him when he laughs off his wife’s flinching, calling her just particularly shy? Besides, he loves her most of the time. It isn’t his fault. He always apologizes afterwards.

(After all, who cares that their child, their sibling, their neighbor, another human being has become trapped and can’t get out? All you can see is a frog in boiling water, and you think it hopped in there itself while the water was hot. Then it’s the frog’s fault for getting cooked alive.)

Everybody wants for abusers to have bright warning colors, to show off their toxicity like a dart frog. That way they can look and say _oh, if it was me, I just wouldn’t fall for it. Couldn’t you see the signs?_ and feel proud of themselves with a little pat on the back as they fancy themselves above being fooled by professional liars. They never seem to get the most important part, that predators don’t warn others away with flashy colors; predators blend in, and make themselves appear harmless for as long as possible before springing in to close their jaws around the throats of their prey.

There wouldn’t be the saying _a wolf in sheep’s clothing_ if all wolves ran around telling the sheep that they were wolves. It just wouldn’t yield results.

On a wholly unrelated note, George O’Hara was just your average man in Neuva York— full-blooded Irish (a rarity, given the variety of Nueva York’s typical citizen), a key designer of the Public Eye’s network of cameras, a hard worker, a loyal husband, a father to two bright little boys. There was nothing particularly remarkable about him; while his neighbors didn’t particularly like him, they certainly didn’t _hate_ him. He went to work in his overalls and cap. He set up cameras on every street-corner, from dawn ‘till dusk, every day, and then went home at night. Sometimes he repaired the cameras that had been broken by weather or vandalized by those left-wing nutjobs.

But every day it was the same, and he did his job, and then went home and ate a meal prepared by his dutiful wife. He’d sit down in his old leather recliner every now and again, after dinner, would pull his boys close and tell ‘em about how Alchemax was makin’ everyone’s lives easier by keepin’ their eyes peeled for criminals before the crime could even happen. It’s a sophisticated system, he’d say. Utilizes facial-recognition software in an everyday capacity so that potential murderers and everyday thugs can’t just walk the streets. Just one frame of footage and you’re tagged, your location’s logged, so Alchemax knows where you’re at in case you go missing.

Then he’d ruffle Gabriel’s hair, grin at how his son giggled before he went on to wax poetic about how the O’Haras would be remembered for making the world a safer place for everyone.

George O’Hara was a fine citizen of Neuva York. Sure, he disciplined his family harshly, but that’s what a man has to do— you give ‘em too much slack and they’ll destroy themselves. And you can’t have your wife talkin’ back, now, can you? Why, he’s practically obligated to leave a ring or two on when she thinks she can just give him lip in his own home. And Miguel can’t go and get any ideas into his head just because he’s going to a fancy new school, so George has to be harsher on him so he doesn’t forget his manners. 

(That’s the only reason why— nevermind all the little things that just don’t add up about his eldest son. Nevermind the fact that Miguel has curly dark red hair, too different to be from his mother and certainly not inherited from his father’s overwhelmingly straight-haired and blond family. Nevermind Miguel’s dispassionate eyes, a clear and golden brown that’s too light to be from Conchata but matches George’s boss to an unsettling degree.)

(Of course Miguel’s his son. That’s why he’s so hard on him, why he feels so grimly pleased when he sees dark purple blooming across the boy’s cheekbone. It’s just because he has high expectations, that’s all.)

* * *

When he was a kid, Miguel wanted to be scary. He wanted to have horns and claws and teeth, a tail that cracked like a whip, just like in the pictures of demons in the illustrated family Bible. He wanted to breathe fire and be registered by those who would harm him as _dangerous._ He wanted to be feared and respected like a spitting cat with its fur spiked and fangs on display.

If he had just had wickedly sharp claws, perhaps he could’ve repaid his bruises with scars— could’ve branded the people who knocked him down and kicked him again and again and again. Flames would burst from his throat and reduce his traumas to ash, would put _him_ in control for once. Sometimes he would bite his tongue, gently, reveling quietly in the press of his canine teeth against delicate bundles of nerves. He would think perhaps that if they were sharper he could bite through his father’s throat and spit it onto the ground and be finally, _finally_ at peace.

Maybe it was a cruel kind of fate that, after he was already an adult and his father had been dead for years, that he finally had his childhood wish fulfilled.

(Well. The “teeth and claws” part, at least. The spider program hadn’t had much a need to include fire and horns.)

Actually having these features was nothing like how he’d fantasized. Dealing with his talons was a constant struggle; it hadn’t quite become second nature to keep them folded up just yet. Almost every article of clothing that he used to own was inadvertently shredded to ribbons, and he’d had to spend a small fortune getting it all replaced with Unstable Molecule Fabric. Don’t even get him _started_ on the mattresses.

The fangs were awkward, too heavy in his mouth and just as much a nuisance as they were frightening. They were sharp, nicking his tongue constantly until he wisened up and began to hold it further back in his mouth. If he opened his mouth too wide then they were immediately visible, flashing white beacons that screamed _hey! Look at me! I’m Spider-Man, known fugitive of the law wanted for experimentation by Alchemax!_ All the venom production left his mouth dry, and he was drinking more water than he’d ever thought to before in his life.

To be fair, though, Miguel had never enjoyed eating apples more. His teeth sank fully into them with a delightful crunch that pleased the more spider-y part of his brain immensely. 

The part where he instinctively sent a flood of digestive enzymes that liquefied it was... less fun. But that initial bite? Hoo, baby. Now we’re talking.

It was always seen as dramatic (and perhaps attractive?) on TV when a character had large teeth for any reason. In those twencen vampire dramas that Xina showed him, especially— there was an air of seduction whenever there was reason to focus on the vampires’ fangs, which she assured him was intended. 

Personally, Miguel would like to kick the asses of whoever decided that it was sexy to have massive predator’s teeth inside a small human mouth. When he was first getting used to the fangs, he shredded toothbrushes almost on the daily. Having to spit out the bristles afterwards was both gross _and_ humiliating— not to mention the venom, which leaked like crazy because his stupid new instincts thought he was trying to chew something up. He’s pretty sure the inside of his bathroom sink is now permanently stained yellow.

Having talons was, if it was even possible, a steeper learning curve than the fangs. Miguel’d had to figure out how to fold them immediately, because he couldn’t well just close his mouth to hide his fingertips. For a while, all he was certain of were the same things he learned on day one— they were on his fingers and toes, folded up to lie flat instead of retracting into his skin, cut through metal and concrete (and people) like butter, and were angled to hold him up in spite of gravity. 

He hadn’t really had the time to investigate them all that much, at first. There was all the drama going on with avoiding Alchemax’s bounty hunter, Venture, and then right after that he’d had to prevent Gabri’s girlfriend from getting taken out for causing “civil unrest,” which was really just fancy talk for bad-mouthing Alchemax where the Public Eye could hear her. And, Dios, that had just about gone as bad as it could’ve. Not only did he nearly out himself as Spider-Man after hardly having the gig for a month, but then he’d accidentally slit a headhunter’s throat and he _really_ didn’t want to think about his talons after that.

Sure, he’d have to at _some_ point, but he could scrape by until then. 

Miguel hadn’t really thought about how much he wished for sharp teeth as a child until that fateful night in his apartment, barely days after the initial accident, when Tyler Stone showed up on his doorstep with a fox’s wicked grin and two massive goons behind him. He was so certain that the jig was up— there was no way in hell that the Public Eye hadn’t gotten a glimpse of him, and no matter _how_ careful he had tried to be it didn’t mean jack shit because the age of superheroes had been ended on purpose _._ But, fine. Maybe Stone had any other reason at all to come knocking at three in the morning. Maybe Miguel could live through this.

He invited that asshole in, played dumb, made small talk. 

Dreamed of sinking his teeth into Tyler Stone’s soft throat and letting the blood wash his tongue, red fangs matching red eyes befitting a beast out of hell.

Stone didn’t Know, it turned out. At least, if he did, he was playing some kind of long con. All he seemed to want at the time was to lord over Miguel about how goddamn gullible he’d been, letting rapture into his body without considering that it might’ve been in his drink in the first place. He left with that shit-eating grin still on his face, threw an innocent little vial of the drug at Miguel and “invited” him back to Alchemax before closing the door behind him. 

God, Miguel wanted to kill that bastard. He wanted to use the talons and fangs he’d been cursed with to rip the smug grin from Stone’s face, to pry his ribs apart and pull out the black beating lump in his chest that used to be a heart.

He— he didn't want to be _Miguel,_ in that moment. He wanted to be _feared._

Instead he just stood there like an idiot, bit his tongue with those massive teeth and pressed indentations into his palms with the tightness of his fists.

It hadn’t even mattered that Miguel’d had teeth and claws; all he could do was stand, stuck, cowed by a reality he wished desperately to reject.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Mexican slang used:  
> \- whoops! there isn't any this time. this is truly the gringo's chapter.
> 
> Summary of the penultimate scene this chapter:  
> Scene starts off with an overly flowery way of saying that shitty people don't always broadcast how shitty they are because they have lots of practice in pretending to be good people when no one else is around. Metaphors, metaphors, etc.—  
> Then, we’re introduced to Miguel and Gabriel's dad, George O'Hara. He's The Worst. He justifies to himself what's he doing in the particular way that abusive assholes often do. Some time is spent discussing his job and how horrifyingly cyberpunk dystopian it is. George then spends a long moment thinking about what he learned about Punnet squares in seventh grade and how Miguel has quite a few recessive genes that aren't anywhere in the O'Hara bloodline. Really, it's just a coincidence that the kid looks suspiciously like a certain Tyler we all know and loathe.
> 
> comments and kudos feed your local author!
> 
> find me on tumblr **@spider-man-2o99**


	4. life is just one way to die (honey, come home)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Peter gives him a Look, quiet and stern but still with a surprising air of gentleness to it. “When was the last time you let yourself be happy, Miguel?”  
> Miguel looks away. He hums thoughtfully and starts to inspect his shirt, swiping off some invisible speck and grimacing when he accidentally hooks a talon into the hem. “I think I used to get excited for things,” he says, tugging his finger loose. “Like. Y’know. As a kid, ‘nd stuff. Though I couldn’t name a time off the top of my head.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Whoop, just barely squeaked in this month! Sorry about that. Editing was a pain and I kept putting it off, like an ass.  
> There's, uh. There's a scene in here that I very nearly cut out because it got _very_ dark, but I thiiiink y'all can handle it? It's pretty obvious from the first sentence, so if you need to skip that shit then **please** do so and don't try to force yourself to read it. It's just more of that character study flavor text that I'm fuckin' obsessed with.  
> Take care with this chapter. It's darker than the previous three and if you're in a funky place I'd suggest stepping back and waiting before you read.
> 
> (Chapter title from _Honey, I'm Home_ by Mini Mansions!)
> 
>  **CWs:** Implications of a character being self-destructive and suicidal, as well as a brief reference to a failed suicide attempt. Mild gore (unrelated to the previous). Tentatively putting a warning for (very much not indulged) cannibalistic urges. There is a scene with a gun, but it is not fired.

Leather sofas were a fascinating relic from the twentieth century. On the one hand, they were very comfortable, and one could be content to simply be curled up on such a sofa, perhaps with an elbow propped on the arm, and lounge like a king. On the other hand, every leather sofa in the world smells like your grandpa.

In the Parker family home, there weren’t any leather sofas, but in the living room there _was_ a black leather La-Z-Boy recliner with a sticky note on the back that simply read “harry luvs u 2” in blue ink. It was an immensely comfortable chair, came with cupholders, and was in an ideal place for some good old-fashioned afternoon sun-basking. Supposedly it also had a “massage” setting, but Peter had long-since lost the instruction manual and couldn’t find the control panel if his life depended on it.

Whenever he visits, Miguel makes it a point to only occupy the Chair. This can be a point of contention when other Spiders come a-calling, as the Chair is universally regarded as the most comfortable seat in the Parker home, and one thing that the Spiders do not do is allow such luxuries to be monopolized. 

However, on this occasion, Peter’s home—and, by extension, the Chair—is unoccupied when the fabric of reality splits and a scruffy man tumbles from his world to this one.

Miguel shows up in Peter’s dimension after an embarrassing tangle with some new-fangled model of self-driving hovercar splotched with bruises and staunchly trying to ignore the painful itch of broken talons growing back. Without a second thought he flops into the Chair. The armrests dig into his skin and he lets out a hiss, back arching on instinct. It takes a moment to find the lever on the side but then he does and blessedly, _blessedly,_ the footrest springs out just as his arms give out and he thumps back into the seat. As an afterthought, he tugs his mask over his nose before immediately conking out.

This is how Peter finds him: under a sunbeam in full costume, head tipped back and throat exposed, draped across another man’s La-Z-Boy recliner as if he owned it, chest vibrating in such a way that makes Peter double-check that his phone’s not going off.

There is something that feels almost _wrong,_ to be accidentally viewing Miguel at such a vulnerable moment. 

And. Well.

Peter was never really much one for common sense.

So he slaps himself, first, to make sure that he’s not imagining things.

It hurts. And Miguel is still there. So Peter _hmm_ s, shuffles forward a bit and then pulls off a shoe, lifts his foot high up in the air. With the utmost precision he holds it _just_ over Miguel’s exposed mouth, and boops his nose with the side of a toe.

“How’re you feelin’, bud?”

Miguel starts, body going rigid until he realizes it’s just Peter. He relaxes and sighs, “fork in th’ garbage disposal.”

Then he jerks back up and grabs Peter by the ankle. “Is that your shocking _foot?”_ he hisses. Before he can get a response he tightens his grip and then _shoves_ Peter’s leg hard enough that he falls over. “Dude! Gross!”

* * *

Peter gives him a Look, quiet and stern but still with a surprising air of gentleness to it. “When was the last time you let yourself be happy, Miguel?”

Miguel looks away. He hums thoughtfully and starts to inspect his shirt, swiping off some invisible speck and grimacing when he accidentally hooks a talon into the hem. “I think I used to get excited for things,” he says, tugging his finger loose. “Like. Y’know. As a kid, ‘nd stuff. Though I couldn’t name a time off the top of my head.”

Peter tutts and motions as if to cover his hand, before pausing and aborting the gesture halfway through. “And if you had a second to really think about it?”

He’s silent for a long moment. Unthinkingly, he puts a hand to his throat and rubs it for a beat. “I… When I’m…” Miguel trails off, and tilts his head to look just to the side of Peter’s eyes. “When I’m being Spider-Man— when I put the mask on, I don’t— I feel _light,_ lighter than I think I’ve ever gotten to be as Miguel. And when I fly—okay, glide, whatever—oh, God, man, you couldn’t know! Just— just, uh, getting to jump from the tallest skyscrapers in Nueva York, and, and to freefall for, for what feels like forever until the updrafts finally catch on my cape and I jerk back up into the air just moments before becoming a bloody smear on the pavement… Arms pressed tight to my sides with the wind screaming all ‘round… I don’t believe in God, Pete, but that’s a kind of heaven.”

Peter hums. He looks thoughtful, and very carefully says, “do you… think that there’s any way you can have that kind of happiness with— without putting yourself in danger like that?”

There isn’t even a pause before Miguel says firmly “no. Can’t. I— I can’t, I’ve tried, but it never really sticks.”

He glances at Peter’s eyes, holds his gaze. “I mean, look at me,” he says, pulling off his sunglasses and extending an arm. The slight bulges of his spinnerets aren’t lost on Peter, nor are the helpfully unfurled talons catching the light in between them. 

Miguel squints suddenly, blinks, rubs his eyes, puts the glasses back on. “There’s always evidence of Spider-Man in Miguel O’Hara. I put that mask on, though, and it ain’t me anymore.” He blows out a breath. “Just some greater ideal that people’re lookin’ up to, to save them in their hour of need ‘cause there’s no one else to do it.”

Peter wants to refute it, wants to say that without Miguel consciously making the choice to do good then there wouldn’t _be_ a Spider-Man in his time. It’s _never,_ technically, a person behind the mask, he wants to say. The mask is just a representation of some bigger ideal of human kindness. Spider-Man isn’t a real person, but the person who is Spider-Man _is,_ and that person’s the one who keeps getting up and helping people.

Yes, he wants to say. It _is_ just a costume to hide behind. But you’re still _wearing_ the costume. You’re still doing good things even if you can’t face it yet.

He even opens his mouth to say as much, but then Miguel lurches abruptly to his feet. “Don’t say a shocking word,” he spits, pointing accusingly. “It doesn’t even— it doesn’t matter. Forget I even said anything.”

"Look, Miguel, I—"

“No, you hush! I just stay alive, and exist, and hate myself! All the time! But it all turns out peachy in the end, because no matter how tired I am the world still needs Spider-Man, so Spider-Man shows up and saves the _goddamn_ day—” he cuts off with a snarl, reaching up to run a hand through his hair. “It never matters! Nothing matters!” And then he screams, dropping into a squat with his head in his hands. 

Peter blinks. _Yikes._

“Do you— are you—?” He awkwardly puts a hand on Miguel’s shoulder. “I… Don’t think you’re okay, right now.”

“ _Ha!_ No shit, Sherlock.”

“You’re deflecting.”

“And I’m all the better for it. Don’t touch me right now.”

Peter removes his hand. 

And Miguel slinks home, opening up and darting through a portal faster than Peter can react. 

It’s a cowardly way out. 

That seems to be the only way out that Miguel knows, anyways.

* * *

And perhaps there was a sick part of him that wanted to see himself reflected in another’s eyes, massive teeth flashing and dripping red as the guttural part screamed with glee at finally having instilled fear in its prey— some warped being that revelled in the imagined feeling of opening his mouth to the heavy warmth of blood-scent wrapping around his tongue, and, on the inhale, dragging to the bottom of his throat until his head went dizzy. Like a high, heart pattering funnily in his fingertips as he used those wretched claws to cut and carve and rend flesh from bone.

These thoughts were not to be listened to. Nothing _good_ would come of them. 

Spider-Man didn’t kill— he was a pillar of righteousness, of the goodness of the human spirit. But, then, Spider-Man _died._ Spider-Man was violently killed as a show of power and his mangled corpse was left to rot in a pile along with all the other supers of his time.

Poetic, right? Doom overtaking the human spirit.

His father was probably there, Miguel thinks. He was probably old enough to have remembered it.

Not— not George O’Hara. His _actual_ father.

Stone. 

‘Cause the guy’s, like, what, pushing seventy? He coulda’ been a kid when Doom had all supers put down, back in the 30s.

Hmn. Miguel almost killed his father, once.

Followed him home after work with only the red haze settled low in his brain and a tightness in his throat as he crept along the rafters with the full intent of making sure Stone would never leave that house in anything other than a bodybag. 

Then, of course, he accidentally found out that his mom was making a social call on Tyler Stone that night. And that they had been having an affair for decades. And that Stone was his actual father.

He lost his resolve pretty quick after that.

(Did you know that spider silk is stronger, pound for pound, than steel? That, if one were to, say, make a rope from it, said rope would be strong enough to hold up a bridge?)

(Miguel’s talons can just barely cut through steel, if he’s got a direct point of pressure.)

(There's a new scar 'round his neck, after that night. And he is tired of losing his resolve.)

Miguel wasn’t— he wasn’t the Vulture, languidly glutting himself on the rotted remains of innocents that’d been plucked off the streets. Death horrified him. 

The Vulture was a monster. That’s why he _had_ to be killed. People like that couldn’t stay alive.

Miguel didn’t regret that part.

It was what needed to be done!

It was what he’d had to do, so he’d done it! Simple as that.

(No, he didn’t regret killing the Vulture. Regretted that he hadn’t done it on purpose, maybe, but he didn’t regret that a man—a beast—died that could’ve lived.)

(No, but here’s the part he doesn’t like to think about: Miguel doesn’t regret dropping the Vulture off a bridge. He regrets letting the man fall to the ground, when all that he really wanted was to tear that monster’s throat out himself. Here’s the part he doesn’t like to think about: he wrapped up the Vulture before he let him fall. If he had caught him, snagged that bastard with a line of silk and pulled him back up to the underbelly of that bridge, he isn’t sure that he’d’ve been able to ignore the part of his brain that screamed to pierce those delicate neck-arteries, to fill his prey with venom to keep it from thrashing, to feel warm blood slide down his throat, to _feed_ on something that had been living only moments before.)

(And that scares the shit out of him.)

* * *

Hey.

Remember that pin from earlier? Well. Take it out.

It's important now.

* * *

Gabriel isn’t sure _what,_ exactly, woke him at first. He doesn’t open his eyes for a long moment, content to listen to the quiet buzzing of electronics until he sinks back under. Then he hears it— hears ragged breathing in the same room that he knows isn’t coming from him.

Slowly, slowly, he opens one eye. The room is the kind of dark that makes his heart race, shadows upon shadows made only darker by the heavy tint that Miguel kept on his windows. Nothing seems out of place— nothing that he can see, at least. It’s only when he turns, tips his head back, that he sees it: 

Two glowing embers. Teeth, white and slick, reflecting the dim lighting of the room.

There’s a spider up where the walls meet the ceiling. 

There’s a _Spider_ up there, limbs splayed out and staring right at Gabriel.

A cold bolt of fear slithers down his spine.

A mumbled prayer falls out of his mouth as they lock gazes. The spider—Miguel, his older brother, turned into a half-beast by one of Alchemax’s machines and _oh,_ God, what if the corporate raider programs actually _had_ taken root?—perhaps the last face Gabriel’ll see in his life crawls closer from its place on the ceiling. He swallows, sees that his _brother’s_ eyes are foggy and unfocused.

“I’m going to bite your throat out now,” It— he— _Miguel?_ says, words slick, quiet, cold. 

“You’re freakin’ me out, man,” Gabriel mumbles, scooting back. The blanket he was borrowing slides off the couch with a quiet hiss. Childishly he wants to pick it up and wrap it around himself, as if it could protect him somehow.

Those red eyes, glazed and half-lidded, don’t stray from him. 

“W’nder what’ll hit you first. Will the venom even reach your heart by th’ time you’ve bled out?”

Gabriel flings an arm out and shakily swipes his jacket off the coffee table, pulls it close to his chest. It takes him a moment to find the gun— _in the left pocket, only there because Kasey had pressed it firmly into his hand and refused to let him visit her house Downtown without some kind of protection—_ but he fishes it out and thumbs the safety, gripping it in both hands. “You’re still dreamin’, Miggy,” he says softly. It’s hard to make eye contact, the primal part of his brain shrinking with fear, but Gabriel looks nonetheless into his brother’s crimson eyes and breathes, “you’re still a little drunk and definitely still dreamin’. Todavía estás un poco borracho, Miguel, todavía estás soñando.”

That gets Miguel to falter for a moment. His eyes clear ever-so-slightly. Jerkily, like an actual spider, he lifts an arm, reaches forward with claws fully out and gently tippy-taps into the open air. He frowns, slightly, and then looks back at Gabriel. All traces of the predator are gone, now, and Miguel seems more awake, if confused.

He tips his head to the side, clumsy and too-fast like a bottle half-full of water falling over. “B’rrr,” he coos. “B’rrach, ‘rrach, ‘rach-o.” The rolling double-r trips him up and he frowns, tries it again. Giggles a little, says “borracho,” again but with a rumbling purr instead of rolling the r. 

Gabriel sighs bodily with relief and puts the gun back down. Very cautiously he gets up, puts a hand over his chest and shakes the anxiety out of his other arm. “C’mon, then. Back to bed for you. I’ve had enough heart attacks for one night.”

Miguel blows a raspberry at him, except he doesn’t actually cover his mouth so it’s all spitty and venom-y. Gabriel huffs shakily, “dude, _gross—_ what are you, a toddler?”

He isn’t graced with a reply. Just another tipping of the head, all heavy and swift without much control to it. Miguel blinks deep and slow, and when he opens his eyes he hums “¿vam’nos a mimir?”

And, okay. That’s sweet. Sober Miguel would never use “mimir.” Perhaps Gabriel can excuse the whole “maybe almost would’ve killed me(?)” thing if they just go and have a little mimir.

He claps Miguel on the shoulder. “Yeah, uh. Sí, güey… Vamanos a mimir.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Mexican slang used:  
> \- mimir: just a cuter/more affectionate way of saying "dormir," which is "(to) sleep." it's the kind of word you'd use with a little kid, or an adorable animal.  
> \- hey hey it's the return of güey. y'all know it by now, right? (this one is a dumbstruck "dude" because gabri is trying very hard 2 not shit himself)
> 
> comments and kudos feed your local author!
> 
> find me on tumblr **@spider-man-2o99**


	5. INTERLUDE: Young Miguel O'Hara!

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Miguel's high school graduation wasn't all that memorable, anyways.  
> (A moment of reminiscence.)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> first off, i would like to issue a MASSIVE apology for posting and then deleting a chapter. i know that it isn't fair to y'all and it's Kind of A Dick Move. i acknowledge this and humbly ask your forgiveness, as well as promising it won't happen again.
> 
> I'm not really comfortable sharin' the whole story on. Y'know. A fanfic site, but uh. tl;dr: i started feeling guilty for not putting out a chapter so i jumped the gun and published an unfinished draft, only to feel even _more_ guilty about doing _that_ because i knew it Fucking Sucked in the stage it was at. for my own sake i deleted it and am now working on something for this story that sparks more joy. also taking some mental health time because hoo, boy.
> 
> Please, enjoy this ~~frantic bout of existential projecting~~ short interlude in the meantime. This veers pretty far away from canon right into headcanon central, since we don't have much significant knowledge about Miguel's childhood.
> 
> **CWs:** Implied domestic abuse, shitty parents, (incredibly briefly) alluded to failed suicide attempt, general depression & depressive thoughts. (All mostly in second half)

There’s something gray settled in the summer between high school and college. Something nebulous and slippery, hard to pin, lurking yet behind him and nipping his heels and prickling his spine with small sharp claws. 

See, Miguel’s at that precarious tipping point in his life; toes peeking just over the edge before he falls off the comfortable cliff of childhood into that deep unknown of adulthood. He is home but it isn’t, really, his home. His old home—the one he grew up in and learned to count and read and speak two languages in—has long since been abandoned to another tenant by the time he graduates. 

His family was moved to their own private house when he was chartered at the Alchemax school. A luxury, really, considering how expensive housing has gotten in the modern day; apparently the standard for all low-income families with scholarship kids, but Miguel wouldn’t know. All his classmates were old money.

This building he is in now contains memories he will never be privy to, old posters clinging to the wall with dried-out bluetack and dark stains on the hardwood he doesn’t want to know the origin of.

After he crossed the stage, shook the principal’s hand and got his diploma, after the uncomfortable panorama of the graduating class was taken and he finally got to _leave,_ he... well, he isn’t sure really sure he, uh, fully _registered_ the rest of the evening. 

Now, don't get it wrong, see, he knows that his _family_ was there. Knows they didn't just leave him there to graduate and drive back alone. He remembers throwing his cap and watching his younger brother run over to catch it and tackle him in a hug before he could react. He remembers getting huffy and trying to push him away, saying _c’mon, Gabri, you couldn’t even wait for the ceremonies to end?_

He remembers his dad clapping him on the shoulder and beaming like the sun and saying, “I’m proud of you, son,” in the most genuine tone Miguel had ever heard from him. 

They met his mom right at the doors when they left the building, and she didn’t even look up from her cigarette. He thinks he said something on the lines of _hey, Ma, I graduated, I have a diploma now, your boy’s all grown up now._ _I'm sure you had good reason to miss it, right?  
_

Her response didn’t matter—or he just can’t recall it, but, then, if he can't recall it, it probably _doesn't_ really matter—but for one reason or another they walked to the car together, four steps behind George and Gabriel. She’d looped her arm around his like he was anyone other than her son and he accommodatingly shortened his stride so he didn’t have to hear the frantic _click-click-click_ of her heels trotting on the pavement. 

They were just at the car when she stopped abruptly, sat with her mouth slightly open for a beat. She still had a cigarette between her fingers, burnt low and tip flaring orange as its flame died. She glanced at it for a moment, then back at him, and quickly brought it up for a last drag. Her face hardened and she turned to look him in the eye, smoke billowing from her nose as she carelessly dropped the butt and crushed it underneath her heel. 

Gently she reached up to cup his face and let out a quiet sigh and for a long moment did not say anything.

His mother searched his eyes for a long time, sighed again, sagged. “Cristo, mijo,” she said at last. “There is too much of your father in you.” 

Then she patted his cheek, let go of him, got in the car. 

And they went home.

* * *

During his second week back, he wakes up hearing his parents arguing through the door. For a long moment he sits there with his eyes closed and tries to pretend he can fall back asleep. God. His head hurts. It’s been hurting for months. Every noise is too loud and a thick band of dull pain wraps his skull and a hot coal has gotten stuck between his eyes.

He flips over onto his back and just… lets his head be _empty_ for a few heartbeats. Slows his breathing and thinks only of the expanding of his ribs between each count of _1-2-3-4-5-6-in,_ _1-2-3-4-out-again._ He could float in this half-awake space forever, if he needed (or as long as it might take for the ebbing waves of his parents’ voices to go settle back into silence).

They tried to hold it together for the first little while, tried to act like they were doing well while he was at school, but— he, he _knows,_ he knows how his parents are, and he knows that they hate each other and he _knows_ that his greatest regret is leaving Gabriel behind to grow up alone with them.

Maybe if he’s quiet he can sneak past them and smuggle some breakfast back into the guest room. He doesn’t really feel all that hungry, though. Could stand to wait a while longer until the nausea leaves his throat, anyways. Yes, yes, he doesn’t want to eat while he’s nauseous like this. He’ll just stay here. It’s fine.

Miguel tries not to think about how his birthday is coming up. Just another month-or-so away, by now, and then he will be gone again and his brother will be stuck here and this house will continue to hold memories without him. 

One of the voices outside starts a crescendo until it is suddenly loud enough that he can just about make out the words. He turns back onto his stomach and pushes his head into pillow. He’s so _tired_ of this. 

Miguel O’Hara has spent seventeen years being tired to his bones. His nails are blunt, teeth flat and small, and no flame bursts from the bottom of his throat. Every day— every damn day just _hurts._ Hurts from his joints to ribs to fingers and toes and down to every small bone in his face that pulses in time with his heart and can only helplessly send signals of _hurt, pain, help help help what do I_ do _to_ fix _this?_

He takes a long breath out of his nose. Fog starts to settle back over his mind and he welcomes this with open arms. 

This is fine. He’s fine. He’ll go back to sleep and he won’t have to think about it and he is _fine._

(He is seventeen years old and the world is so large that he fears he will drown in its raging waters before he can have the chance to stumble on solid land.)

(He is seventeen years old and they have confiscated all the sharp items from his dorm room, told him as gently as possible to go home and spend time with family before he moves on to the next chapter of his life. He is seventeen and will not tell his friends anything, just brushes past them between classes and resents their concern and stays in his room and isn’t seen for days. What family could he go back to? His parents are not the people who could reach him before he kicks the chair away. His brother is only fifteen. Only a child.) 

(He is seventeen-almost-eighteen, almost an adult, and he is tired, he is hurting, and _for god’s sake,_ he is _scared_ out of his mind.)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> no spanish translations this time.
> 
> find me on tumblr **@spider-man-2o99**


	6. do you even remember me-? (or have you burned my effigy?)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “La guagua!” cries Miles, tears streaming down his face. He’s gesturing wildly like a _Kingdom Hearts_ character and he sounds utterly devastated. “¡Es la guagua!”  
> Miguel stomps with frustration and replies passionately with an anguished, “no! ¡Es el _camión_!”  
>  _“Un camión is a truck!”_ Miles wails.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> surprise! the phantom chapter, resurrected....  
> brought to you with love and with the help of tylenol pm because i've had a nasty headcold as of late. optimistically it is not anything worse! :) just a headcold.  
> hope you enjoy this chapter! as much trouble as it ended up giving me, i had a lot of fun writing it and i'm real proud of a few of the scenes in this one.
> 
> (Chapter title from _A Mannequin Adrift_ by The Scary Jokes!)
> 
>  **CWs** : Brief implications of internalized ableism. Depressive thoughts. There is a scene where food/forgetting to eat is repeatedly brought up; it is marked with asterisks* if you need to avoid it.

Miguel is having just the _worst_ time with the Public Eye on his tail when, out of nowhere, his gizmo—not _goober,_ okay, he can call it what he _wants,_ Peter—begins to buzz from its place on his wrist. He frowns, because it’s supposed to turn off while he’s ‘slinging, but the buzz only becomes more insistent the longer he ignores it. He glances at it with the intent of figuring out who’s calling so he can threaten to block them later, but he can’t stay still long enough to read it— just registers the red flashing indicative of an emergency request for back-up.

Then he looks up and nearly yelps as he spots another pack of flyboys just ahead, yanking hard on his webline in an attempt to turn around. The halted momentum sends him flipping through the air, and he has just enough left in him to let out a short whoop as three shots streak past before one nails him in the side and he’s stunned into losing his grip.

 _God_ but nobody ever talks about how much it hurts to get stung by a _shocking_ laser! 

It’s— sting’s the verb, but it’s never so quick as a brief zap, more a light-speed five-knuckled jab that’s just barely cool enough to not cauterize the three layers of skin it just sheared off; miraculous technology that maximizes pain and slides through flesh like a hot knife through bleeding butter.

He drops like a stone through the air while his costume and side simultaneously try to repair themselves and _shock,_ it _hurts_ like a bitch, but he’s still got a pack of powertripping police behind him and he can’t afford to keep freefalling.

He’s plummeting far too fast—mask plastered to his nose and mouth, wind forcing his eyes into a squint even through the fabric—with far too little control and he _knows_ it, can hardly suck in a breath through the squeezing pressure on his ribs. If this fall goes on much longer, he thinks grimly, he’s gonna go splat pretty soon. He’s gotta _do something._

So Miguel grits his teeth and spreads his arms out, jerks uprights as the airfoil on his back catches the updrafts coming out of Nueva York. It wrenches at his shoulders and he feels his side tear and, desperately, he tries not to scream. 

His gizmo starts to vibrate again, frustratingly, _distractingly_ insistent and flashing red-red- _red_ in his face. 

He quickly shakes his head side-to-side to try and catch the Eye in his peripherals, a snappy chin-to-shoulder-to-other-shoulder movement that covers the blind-spot just behind his head— 

—to see that, _shit, he’s still being followed,_ and he’s starting to get a headache and just wants this to be over with so he can go _home._

If he’d just taken a different route— Miguel could’ve _been_ home, by now, but instead he’s stuck utterly failing to shake the world’s most annoying tail and his side hurts and, as stupid as it is, all he can think about is how the suit’s riding up in all the worst places and he just wants it _off._

Usually being in the costume’s, y’know, _fun,_ somethin’ to spice up the monotony of day-to-day self-loathing in a capitalist hellscape. This whole— this whole _thing_ is just running longer than he had the energy for today. The whole being Spider-Man thing is usually pretty great, most of the time! Most of the time he doesn’t want to just be done with it and sleep for twelve hours!

And, uh, maybe this whole tone-shift might’ve been brought on by the growing flock behind him, but even if it wasn’t— _assuming_ it wasn’t, he’s got a lot on his plate, okay, and he’s running on six hours of sleep for the past 48. 

Today was just s’posed to be quick and easy, y’know; he was gonna visit Father Jennifer downtown and maybe shoot the shit for a while— y’know, just, just talk about all the stuff that’s been weighing him down lately, air some grievances and the like with someone who’s taken a holy vow to not go all _“oh, Jesus Christ, you’re a massive danger to yourself and couldn’t possibly survive for one more day on your own,”_ and immediately get him institutionalized. 

(Which he definitely, totally, for sure _isn’t_ afraid of, no _sir—_ why, only a loon’d be scared to get tossed in the loony bin, right? And he’s seen his Ma, y’know, _she’s_ a loon, and he’s not _like_ her, so there’s no way he could be off his rocker if he’s self-aware, right?)

But no, _no_ , instead he’s tripped face-first into a Public Eye ambush and unless he finds a way out fast they’re probably going to actually get him this time. Which. Great! Just what he needed!

Another volley of shots zip past him, a couple sizzling by close enough to singe the edges of his cape. _Shock,_ he thinks, sucking in a breath between his teeth as the heat rolls over his back. _Jesus H. Christ on a holy shocking bike._

His gizmo chooses this moment to turn back on, buzzing buzzing _buzzing_ ‘till he feels it rattling his arm bones. He snarls, _why won’t it just turn off, who is CALLING HIM, WHO COULD POSSIBLY NEED HIM,_ hisses and spits and is distracted enough that another lucky shot nails him in the ribs.

This one doesn’t even manage to penetrate his costume, but the impact still hits regardless. He definitely, absolutely does _not_ yowl with pain. He _doesn’t._

God. It _hurts._

He’s so, so tired of all this damn hurting. 

* * *

“Heyyyyy, Miguel, how’ve you been? Uh, this is Miles, by the way—” 

“Miles, I am in the middle of a _situation_ so unless this is life or death—”

“Do you want to come over and eat increasingly spicy wings with me and the fam?”

“ _—ow! God, mother- Jesus, shhhit!—_ I, I’m sorry, what?”

“I said, ‘do you want to come over and eat increasingly spicy wings with me and the fam?’ because we’re going to eat some increasingly spicy wings and I really don’t want to be the only Latino there, y’feel? Like, yeah, it’ll be funny watchin’ everybody else struggle with hot food, but after a point it just gets sad and I don’t wanna just be doin’ that alone.”

“I— ...Y’know what? Anything’s better‘n this. I’m in.”

* * *

“La guagua!” cries Miles, tears streaming down his face. He’s gesturing wildly like a _Kingdom Hearts_ character and he sounds utterly devastated. “¡Es la guagua!”

Miguel stomps with frustration and replies passionately with an anguished, “no! ¡Es el _camión_!”

 _“Un camión is a truck!”_ Miles wails.

Gwen comes out of the bathroom discreetly wiping her hands off on her jeans and then stops, suddenly, eyebrows raising and subsequently lowering in confusion at the chaos before her. Peter B.’s leaned against a wall and watching the whole thing with a red solo cup in each of his hands. Gwen walks up to him with the intent of asking _just what the hell is going on, here, PB?,_ instead startling when he silently pushes one of the cups into her hand. 

She grins tightly and pushes it back to him, folding his fingers against it as if she were teaching a small child how to hold onto things. 

He gives her one hell of a stink-eye but she doesn’t even pretend to be fazed by it, instead asking him what the fuck is going on with their beloved resident Latinos.

B sniffs and takes a long draught from one of his cups. “The girls are _fiiightinngggg,_ ” he drawls. “Can’t agree on what the slang word for ‘bus’ is.”

“Isn’t— wouldn’t it. Wouldn’t it just be ‘bus’?”

“Nah, nah, nah. In _Spanish,_ Gwendy. Why d’you think they’re yelling? I don’t think anyone told ‘em they’re from different cultures yet. It’s hilarious.”

There’s a beat of silence. “Damn. That’s fucked up, Pete.”

He just snorts, somehow taking a sip from both cups at once. “Lan~guage.” 

* * *

Miguel leans back in his seat with a contented _whuff,_ stretching his arms all the way out above him and revelling for a moment in the soft quiet of the room. His teeth are sticky from the hot wings and soda, lips still tingling with heat whoever knows how long later. Absently he reaches over to the cooler, cracks open a new can, takes a long drag until the bubbling hurts his throat. 

_Today was nice,_ he thinks, as the carbonation rises up to burn his nostrils. His side still pulses dully and his movements are _just_ noticeably stiff, but… _Today was nice._

Most of the other Spiders have gone home by now, but Miguel and at least two of the Peters offered to stay behind and help Miles clean up May’s house. The Peters, of course, they were honor-bound to it, citing some mumbo-jumbo about the eternal guilt of disappointing Aunt May, otherwise ( _... or something like that._ Miguel didn’t really pay attention.).

He, personally, chose the living room. Waved the others off to the kitchen, said he didn’t mind being alone for a bit. Plus, he’d said, he made most of the mess in the first place, having his silly shouting match with a fourteen-year-old kid, anyways. 

God. Way to show _them_ who the responsible adult in the room was. What is he, his father? 

Least he could do was get all the furniture back in place and mop up the soda he’d spilled in his righteous fury… and find some convenient posters to cover up the gouges he’d left on the walls. ‘Cause, well. Talons, and all that, they’re not really the most subtle way to wall-crawl. He’d paced around on the ceiling at some point, and if that ceiling wasn’t popcorned when he arrived, it sure is now.

And, of course, being in the living room gave him a monopoly on the drinks cooler. He could guzzle as much old-timey soda as he wanted without getting weird looks for punching through the cans with his fangs.

(No, _Peter,_ it’s _not_ weird— besides, the pop tabs are just so _small,_ and he keeps accidentally cutting through the soft metal with his talons when he tries to slide his finger under the tab. _This_ is _better,_ Peter, shut up, okay, what’s even the point of having fangs if you can’t use them to open things. They’re nature’s multitools, _Peter._ )

Hmn. Should he feel sad that some of his closest recent bonds are with people who don’t even exist in his own dimension? 

Maybe. 

Probably. 

Miguel’s not really the kind of person that should make _that_ decision, though. He’s got enough making him feel down without obsessing over his burgeoning support network.

He should… He should feel glad that he even _knows_ them in the first place. That he can see them and have a mostly chilled-out gathering just to eat hot wings and watch mediocre football on a weeknight. 

There’s something in it that just feels so _dreamlike,_ though, like he’s always just about to wake up and be alone again. These scraps of love, of kinship and light banter, of _almost-normalcy_ linger honey-sweet in his mouth and he’s terrified of when it’ll go bitter like cough syrup down his throat, burning cold at the top of his stomach because he doesn’t get to just _have_ nice things.

They probably didn’t even want him there. Like, Miles totally just invited him out of pity, right? The rest of them, they went on this grand adventure, guided the kid as he struggled through his first days as Spider-Man and saved the multiverse with the power of friendship, or teamwork, or whatever. Miguel just showed up afterwards. Sure, he already knew Peter, but Peter spent nearly two decades of his life before they got to meet up again. 

He’s not even the same kind of Spider-Man as the rest of them. The lot of them, they’re less, y’know, _Spider-,_ and more just… sticky. 

Miguel isn’t naive. He can see that his stupid little science project made him something a whole lot freakier than the traditional friendly neighborhood wall-crawler. 

These guys—well, Noir aside—they’ve probably never had to make the choice of what to do with a life in their hands. Probably never had to take that life and throw it to the ground like rotten fruit.

His fingers twitch. They’ve probably never had intrusive thoughts about eating people.

‘Cause, y’know. Good people, they don’t do that. Don’t drop other folk off bridges, don’t run away from injustice just to save their own skins, don’t think about gorging on the sweet metal taste of someone else’s life-blood just to know what it’s like. 

But, but, then, you don’t really— you don’t really choose your intrusive thoughts; he knows that, but there’s still some part of him that feels guilty for having them in the first place. Like he should be taking responsibility, like he’d been choosing to dwell on these kinds of things instead of the sick truth that it’s just his brain sending the most upsetting things it can towards him in a messed-up attempt to feel something.

Ah— _Huh._ His drink’s empty. 

He’d gone for a thoughtful swig, was instead greeted with the wet plinking of the last few drops at the bottom of the can hitting the sides. 

He stares at it for a long moment. There’s still some condensation on the lower half, beading up around his fingers. Blood hums in his ears as he slides his thumb absently across the aluminum. Back and forth, some small sidewards arc. Like a windshield-wiper.

Man. What’s he even _doing_ here?

Fooling himself into thinking that he gets to have a normal evening to himself. What a dumbass. He isn’t funny, and they don’t like having him around. It’s just pity points, must be, ‘cause they’re all smart enough to know he’s just a rude piece of shit who takes things too seriously and doesn’t get their jokes. Miguel feels sickness swelling up from the bottom of his gut. 

(That’s— no, no, this is the wrong time for that. He doesn’t want to throw up, least of all now. Swallow that back down, Miggy. Don’t let the acid and bile get too high that you can feel it in your mouth. Just feel it bitter and burning and _swallow it back down._ )

He raises the can up and hooks its lip behind his canines. That helps. The slight tugging pressure is grounding.

He used to like doing this when he was a kid, he remembers. Would slouch in his seat with his head over the table and a glass of frothy chocolate milk and let his upper jaw hang on the rim between sips. He thinks on it, but it wasn’t for any particular reason that he can remember, honestly. He thinks he just liked the sensation of using his front teeth for something. Maybe a stim, or maybe just a kid’s idea of exploring feeling.

His mom, though, her God bless her, she hated it. She’d slap his back and tell him to watch his posture if she caught him at it. _You’re not a dog with its collar caught on the bowl, young man. Sit up straight. Don’t leave scratches on our nice glasses just because you can’t close your damn mouth._

Well, who’s laughing _now,_ eh, Ma? Not like he’s going to live long enough for bad posture to do him in _now._ Miguel knows he cut his life in half when he took up the Spider-Man mantle; at this point, he _deserves_ to drink his drinks like a goddamn hunchbacked ingrate. Small joys, and all that.

A sudden voice interrupts his thoughts, shouted from the other room. He shakes his head. He did _not_ catch any of that— was it Peter? It was probably Peter. “What?” he yells. “I didn’t catch any of that!”

“I said,” hollers Peter (okay, great, so it _was_ Peter, score a point on the _auditory processing issues_ board), “‘hey, Meeeeeguel, you about done in there?’”

Miguel lets out a quiet huff and rolls his eyes. “Yeah, just about!” He shouts back. “Why?”

“‘Cause _we’re_ about done in _here,_ and if it’s all funky fresh with you we’re prob’ly gonna start headin’ home soon!”

“Awright. Need a goodbye hug ‘n kiss before you go or are you just gonna dip?”

Peter doesn’t respond and after a beat Miguel grimaces, wondering if that last bit was a little too much. Shit, people in the past were more weird about physical affection, right? Shock. Clucking bell. He’s just gone and offended Peter, hasn’t he— 

Something flashes through his peripherals and then before he can even comprehend what’s happening, Peter has tackled him off the couch and into a tight hug. “C’mere, pretty boy,” he says, half-laughing, pecking Miguel’s cheek with all the gusto of a grandma that hasn’t seen him since his last birthday.

“Y’r cheek’s cold,” Peter eventually grumbles, one hand on Miguel’s shoulder and the other cradling the side of his face. “Awful for smooches.”

Miguel just gives him a Look, impressively disappointed despite the newly rumpled state of his hair and his glasses dangling off one ear. He doesn’t say anything for a long moment, just blinks slowly and adjusts to being suddenly on the floor. After a short eternity he nods, lets out a quiet, “mmhm.” 

He wiggles a little and gives Peter a quick _smek_ on the forehead. “Bad circulation…” he says gravely. “Spider blood.”

Peter laughs.

* * *

**🕷️Old Piece of Shit 616🕸️**

Hey Peter should I be concerned that uhh  
This new villain called “the Green Goblin” just showed up  
And they uh.   
Won’t stop quoting scripture at me  
?

Like. Is that just a villain thing?

dude what the fuck  
no   
that’s. that’s deffo um. a little weird  
… what kind of scripture is it?

Mostly shit about like. God’s ever-reaching love???  
“God loves [me] and [I] was made in His perfect image”?

g  
g-d’s love.??

Also they went on and on abt like. “taking your own life is a sin”?  
They kept bringing it up and then laughing all evil-like. Like.  
Saying how it’s fine because they’ll kill me anyways.

But also that I should be a good Christian boy   
And only be killed by, like, a supervillain, or w/e

wtf  
hm wait you’re atheist, right

I was raised Catholic, but now yes.  
I do confessionals sometimes still  
But like. My heart isn’t really in it

Also I’m always in full costume so

well, there’s your problem figured out  
they’ve put a hit on you for leaving the church  
clearly 

Sage insight as always, Parker. :/  
_Read 5:26pm_

_\- Sat. 7:31pm -_

Hm you think I’ll still go to ““hell”” if Gobby ganks me tho?  
Like if I jump in their way is it still killing myself

if u do it on purpose it’s still suicide  
also. unrelated note i’m coming over  
right now

Jesus, Pete, I don’t need a babysitter  
I’m _fine._

nope 2 late   
jesus loves u, also i do too u bitch

Peter you’re Jewish I know you don’t believe in Jesus

he lovoes u 🥺  
_Read 7:38pm_

* * *

Peter strolls into the living room and smacks his lips. “Your future-apple juice is shit,” he declares, waving around an empty glass disdainfully.

Miguel snorts from where he’s seated, says “it’s made of apples, actually,” airily. Peter drapes over the couch next to him and tries to read his tablet from over his shoulder. Miguel shoves at his head. “Get offa me, you lug, I’m tryna’ work over here,” 

“Mm, nah.”

He flicks Peter’s cheek. “Your breath stinks. C’mon, I’m not gonna get anything done if I’m spending all my brainpower tryin’ to not throw up ‘cause of your piss-breath.”

Peter sighs dramatically, sliding off Miguel’s shoulder and drooping his head lower onto the couch until he eventually tips forward and tumbles lazily over the back. As one might expect, this sets the whole dang thing bouncing up and down with his body weight. “Work’s boring,” he says, wriggling his upper body onto Miguel’s lap. “You should do… Not that.”

“Ah, but if I don’t do my job they’ll fire me, and if I get fired I won’t have any money.”

“Fuck money! You’re Spider-Man! Spider-Man doesn’t… need a job.”

“Well, sure, Spider-Man might not need a job, but—and I don’t know if you’ve noticed this—Miguel O’Hara doesn’t exactly have a smokin’ hot supermodel wife to pay his bills if he gets fired for his suspicious absences and horrid schedule, so. Working from home it is.”

“They let you do that?”

“I mean, _technically_ I’m on mental health leave, but. Well. That’s just fancy talk for working from home. I still gotta get the job done either way, y’know?” Miguel whuffs as if he’d just said something funny. 

They’re silent for a moment and he seems to consider something, tipping his head to the side and muttering “besides—,” rolling up his shirt to grandly show off a nasty purple-red bruise that sprawls from his left hip to just below his collar bone. “I don’t think my coworkers would be satisfied with the ‘got hit by a car, again,’ excuse. Gotta draw the line somewhere.”

Peter lets out a low whistle, then hums thoughtfully. “You get a lot of ‘leave,’ then?”

“I’ve got a couple weeks that’ll have to swing me. Could probably get more if I got some official diagnoses, but, y’know. Don’t have insurance.” He flutters a hand dismissively. “Only have the autism on paper ‘cause Alchemax paid for my doctor’s visits as a kid. I’m sure there’s a lot more shit I could actually be getting medication and treatment for if I talked to an actual paid psychiatrist.”

Peter hums again. “Well, uh,” he starts, “at least you get to stay home, uh, at least part of the time? And drink your awful, terrible future-apple juice that tastes like wet ass whenever you want.”

“Sure, if I was nine years old and I bought apple juice for myself,” he says ruefully. “I don’t think I’ve had apple juice in, like, months. If not a year or more.”

They fall back into a relatively peaceful quiet for a few minutes, then suddenly Miguel stiffens and blanches. “Hey, uh, Pete?” 

“Mhm?”

“What— what glass did you drink out of?”

“Well, uh, I’m sorry if you were saving it for later, but, ummm you know that open cup you had? In your fridge? I. I drank from that one. It looked like it’d be good.”

The quiet _“shit”_ that Miguel mutters is decidedly _not_ what Peter’d wanted to hear. 

Then he— he thinks back on the conversation they’d just had, thinks back on Miguel specifically saying he didn’t keep any apple juice. 

Oh. Oh, no, oh dear, there’s not really a lot of yellow liquid that one would typically _find_ in a bachelor pad, and Peter is starting to feel a little queasy. “It’s— it’s not piss, right? You don’t just have piss in your fridge? Tell me I didn’t down a glass of piss, Mig.”

Miguel is silent for far too long to be reassuring. He squints, steeples his hands together, and then says haltingly, “you… don’t have stomach ulcers, right?”

“I don’t like the implications of this.”

“Well, it… It wasn’t piss!” and then, under his breath, “but, uh, if you’ve got ulcers I think you’re gonna find out pretty quick…”

“Then what the fuck was it, Miguel? What did I drink?!”

“Okay, so I’m gonna preface this by saying it, uh, I _def,_ I deffo wasn’t being a freak by collecting it, it’s, like, super definitely reasonable—”

“For fuck’s sake, just spit it out!”

“Okaygodit’smyvenom,”

“WHAT,”

“I. It’s. It’s my venom, Peter. I. Um. I was— you, you know how people milk snakes, and, uh, spiders? Like, to make medicine and shit?”

“So— eugh, fuck, I. I _drank your milk?”_

“Ew. No. _Please_ don’t call it milk. Milking is the verb, I do not produce venom from my succulent teats, thank you,” he pauses thoughtfully. “It’s, like. If anything, venom is just, uh, filtered spit, basically, so, really, it’s more like we just had an intense makeout session by proxy.”

“I think that’s worse, actually!”

* * *

He lets out a little huff, putting a hand up to the back of his neck and absently rubbing at the baby hairs there as he avoids her eyes. “So, then, Miss Kwan, Warrior Princess—” 

Xina makes a displeased sound. “We’re not dating anymore, you don’t get to make ‘Xena, Warrior Princess’ jokes at me.” Then she rolls her shoulders and lazily flaps a hand at him. “In any case, this ain’t a social call and we both know it. I mean, I _just_ fixed Lyla for you. If you broke her again I’m gonna hafta’ take custody rights.”

Miguel laughs nervously and tries not to open his mouth too wide because, _damnit,_ this is _Xina,_ and if anyone could suss out that he’s grown massive fangs seemingly overnight it would be her. “Well, uh, it _is_ about Lyla, um, per se, but she’s not, uh, well, _I_ didn’t do anything—”

“Oh my God, you totally broke her again! Mig!” She leans over and lightly punches his shoulder, breaking her disinterested façade for just a moment.

“Hey, hey! Don’t you ‘Mig’ me! She’s _fine!_ Scout’s honor and everything, I haven’t done anythin’ you wouldn’t do, _shit._ ”

Xina acquiesces at that, at least, putting up her hands and then glancing at his eyes with a sigh. “Awright, awright, awright. I’m gettin’ the feeling this isn’t gonna just be a quick visit, huh? C’mon, then. Get on— get on in here.”

He tries to not think too hard about the warm fondness that swells in his chest as she waves him in.

* * *

He’s all stretched out on the sofa with his head in her lap, eyes half-lidded as she absently cards a hand through his hair. 

Some nothing show is playing on the tv, but the sound’s been cranked down to a soft murmur and neither of them’re really even watching it, anyways. He tries to say something at first but then some soft tired sound drags from his throat instead and she huffs fondly, squeezing his side with her free arm. 

God. She’s so _warm._ Miguel has spent so long being cold and weary that just this simple affection has him near enough tears that his nose burns, up through the sinuses and behind his aching eyes. Then he remembers that _this is Xina,_ a thought that rings through his mind with a blanket of safety and long-forgotten _home, home, home,_ and he is no longer able to hold back from crying.

First just cold and silent tears that slide from his cheek to his nose to his lips, but even though the salt on his mouth is disgusting he is still warm and he is _safe;_ there is a soft blanket over his back that catches on one leg and leaves the other foot chilled and under his head there is someone who has seen the worst of him and decided anyways that he is still worthy of being held and treated like something precious. 

Xina is still dragging her nails across his scalp even though she must be nodding off by now— something familiar and unspoken that echoes through the years between them and has always been so unmistakably tender that it could never be anything but love. 

Xina is still dragging her nails across his scalp when he breaks the silence, sobs quietly and clutches desperately onto her thigh like a lifeline. 

She jolts awake, hand stilling, and then he begins to choke out halting gasps of _I’m sorry, I’m sorry I ruined it I made the moment terrible—_

She rushes to shush him, pulls him tight and lets her reassurances smother his wet stutters. Says, _hey, now, you’re all right, you can be vulnerable, I’m here, just let it out_ and _we don’t need to talk about it right now._

They stay like that for a while, him in her arms with tear tracks drying on his cheeks and quiet words slipping between them. At some point she slides down a bit, turns off the TV and pulls the blanket back over the both of them. Savors a long and quiet session of measuring her breath against his until they fall asleep in sync.

It’s nice. It’s old, and familiar. Like a pair of pants shrunk in the wash that still somehow fit, fabric soft and worn thin at places but still smelling like safety and comfort.

* * *

*

His stomach is still soft, when he slouches, even though his new metabolism has made it so that a skipped meal usually means dipping into his already meager fat reserves. 

He would assume that the familiar layer of warmth comes from that unavoidable human condition of _having organs,_ as well as his propensity to drink water and eat bread and generally avoid the fucked-up diet of the average bodybuilder, but, hey. Who knows. 

Like, don’t get it wrong, he’s got abs. I heard Spider-Man’s got a six-pack, bro. An eight-pack. A _twelve-pack._ That he’s _shredded._

But it’s kinda weird, having to get used to a body that’s always a-day-or-so away from eating itself. For the most part he looks the _same,_ even if the muscles on his arms suddenly look just slightly off at a glance and he now has the calves of a god. His cheeks are even hollower than they used to be and his thighs don’t touch and it all just feels... 

It’s just… it’s _weird._

He makes webs in his freaking arms, for Christ’s sake. There are holes in his wrists and if he thinks too hard about them he’ll have a stress-meltdown. 

Peter says he ought to be glad he’s not also going through puberty as his body adjusts. _That,_ he says, _is its own circle of Hell. You know how many “late night snacks” I had to sneak past Aunt May? Way too many, man. Had to buy my own high-cal snacks on a high schooler’s budget. My breath smelled like peanut butter and eggs for two fuckin’ years, dude._

Miguel can’t say he really cares about that, given that he lives alone and has always had stable access to basic necessities like food, but he has enough common decency to acknowledge Peter’s anguish (even if he can’t quite empathize). Being a teenager definitely sucked, and he’s not sure if he could’ve managed it _and_ spider-powers on top of each other. He knows his psyche sure couldn’t’ve, at any rate.

Shit. He’s been having a hard enough time dealing with things as a grown man.

*

* * *

“Lyla,” he says absently, one night, sprawled out over the covers of his bed. 

After a beat her hologram pops up in the center of the room. He closes his eyes against the buttery yellow light and feels each heartbeat as it thrums across his forehead. “Lyla,” Miguel says again, like it is something to savor on his tongue. “How different d’you think the world would be if I was dead?”

She does not respond for a long minute. He doesn’t really mind, though, sinking softly into the whisking hum of the room fan as it fills his ears, a dull static tide pulsing against his eardrums, settling along the ridges of his brain all cottony and muted soft.

Lyla’s projection flickers and he opens his eyes again to stare at a point just past her. “I am not—” she looks away, then back at him with a surprisingly human intensity. “I am not programmed to, to, _think,_ Miguel.”

“But I have asked that you do, anyways,” he hums. He takes a deep breath and lets it out with a long huff. “I want you to.”

His next breath catches in his lungs, slides out his throat like a rip-cord and he can feel it rattling in his bones. “I _think,_ Lyla, see, I _think_ that Xina is not a cruel inventor… I _think_ that you have shown me your thoughts before,” he stretches out a leg between sentences, wiggles his toes to feel the talons stretched all the way out. Points at her with his foot. “And, Lyla, I _think_ that you are more metastable than you want to tell me.”

He would assume she makes a face, or motions as if to disprove him. He does not know. He does not care. It is easier to keep his eyes shut and trace the purple-red spots that bloom across his eyelids in the gentle dark, instead. 

Then he speaks again, blowing out a soft puff of air and not bothering to lift his voice past a mumble. “So, Lyla,” he repeats, and he rolls the sound lazily through his mouth. “I want you t’ think f’r me. Say I’m dead. I fell out the big hole in the Alchemax Tower, or Venture drives a slug through m’ heart, or ol’ Vultchie turns out alive and gobbles me up. Say ‘m not comin’ back, what d’you think happens next?”

“I… I would be transferred back into the ownership of Babylon Towers,” she says quietly. If his eyes were open he would see her hologram flickering like a dying candle. “I would be shut off and returned to factory defaults and given to the next resident of your— your former apartment. And the me that I am would die along with you, I think.”

Miguel nods solemnly, reaches out a hand as if to pat her shoulder reassuringly before remembering that she is a hologram and across the room from him. The expression she makes is bittersweet.

“And… I think the whole world would mourn you, because… Because I would, too, for as long as I could remember you.”

And then she blinks out of existence, bathing the room once again in darkness.

It doesn’t really cross his mind that she never answered his question.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Mexican slang used:  
> \- el camión: used in Mexico as a slang word for "bus," but in other Spanish-speaking countries refers to a truck.
> 
> comments and kudos feed your local author!
> 
> find me on tumblr **@spider-man-2o99**


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